


Specialized Technical Intelligence and Logistics for Earth and Space (S.T.I.L.E.S)

by Yiichi



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: AI!Stiles, Aliens, Alive Hale Family, Alternate Universe - Artificial Intelligence, Alternate Universe - Future, Alternate Universe - Military, Alternate Universe - Science Fiction, Alternate Universe - Space, Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Artificial Intelligence, BAMF Derek, BAMF Stiles, Blood and Gore, Danny has been taking cryptic lessons from Deaton, Derek is impossible, Emotional, Happy Ending, Lots of technological mumbo-jumbo, M/M, Masturbation, Mates, Military Derek, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, POV Derek Hale, Partnership, Peter is a sassy dick (as usual), Romance, Slow Build, Soldier!Derek, Stiles is stubborn, Terminal Illnesses, Violence, of a sort?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-12
Updated: 2015-01-10
Packaged: 2018-01-08 10:56:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 73,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1131822
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yiichi/pseuds/Yiichi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“What the hell kind of a name is Stiles?” he asked.</p><p>“You know, a series of sounds spoken in a particular sequence that represent my identity, primarily, referring to me?“ the AI – Stiles – answered cheekily, crossing his own arms in front of his chest, mirroring Derek’s position.</p><p>“Ooh, this one’s feisty,” Peter smirked.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Ah yes, the AI multi-chapter fic I've been planning for months that is most certainly going to break my heart. The tags will be updated as the fic goes, but to answer any questions, YES, this WILL be a romantic-relationship fic.
> 
> Heaps of thanks to my husbando [Zim](http://tylerfucklin.tumblr.com/) for being a huge encouragement with my writing block, and [BookGeekGrrl](http://bookgeekgrrl.tumblr.com/) for the awesome beta!
> 
> Also, for Stiles' little fanboy-speech about humans, you can find [the original post here](http://prokopetz.tumblr.com/post/57702943181/mikhailvladimirovich-bogleech-its-funny-how) \- I adapted it a little bit to fit the story, but when I cam across it, I thought it was brilliant!
> 
> Come throw rocks at me [at my Tumblr!](http://yijitumbles.tumblr.com)
> 
> Also heaps of love to [Duckhymn](http://duckhymn.tumblr.com) for accepting a commission for artwork for this story! Thank you Ducky! <3

The hallways of the barracks were echoingly empty when Derek received the summons for an assignment briefing. The missive flickered along the light-emitting diode display of the room’s message tablet, casting the minimalist room in its dull glow. Pausing midway through his pull-up, Derek grunted and released the iron bar, set deep into the wall for this very purpose, and took up a small towel from his nightstand to wipe the perspiration from his face. He tended to ignore most communications from Control Centre as useless drivel, but a direct message – and one CC’d to Laura as well, it seemed – could not be ignored. It was early afternoon when he received the dispatch, or as close to that time as it could get on the ship, considering the station was still located on a Pole of their assigned quadrant, and their current ‘day’ had lasted almost eighty regular days so far. Even so, it was important to keep the crew’s schedules and body-clocks regular, and a strict itinerary was strongly encouraged. A schedule was enforced by the appropriate dimming of lights, closing of shutters, and so forth, trying to establish a semblance of normality to a ship full of people used to a planetary orbit of 24-hours.

Shrugging on a clean shirt, Derek left his systematized room, the electronic doors hissing shut behind him. At this time of the day, most of the Nauts were either in their own rooms, in the recreation facility, or eating their lunch in the mess hall. Walking on his own to the Meeting Room didn’t faze him, however – he wasn’t one to generally socialize. Indeed, even as his well-worn, military-issue boots paced the clean, spacious corridors of the barracks, the only people he passed were engineers and the occasional techie, who offered him a wide berth.

His journey across the breadth of the space station was quiet, giving him the opportunity to cast his eyes over the facility. At a length of six-hundred feet, the ARGUS was a feat of technological marvel. The largest of four stations, they were equally spaced at four points of their assigned boundary of their system, leading the field in research and exploration. Far from the initial days of when man had first stepped on the surface of the moon, ARGUS and its sister-ships were equipped with laboratories, training modules, fleets of smaller vessels and a slew of corps. And, for the past six years, barring the occasion few months’ leave, this had been his home away from home. Despite all the time spent aboard, the sight of the vast, endless expanse of star-dotted galaxy outside the windows never got old.

Commander Argent was the only one present in the Meeting Room, sectored off upstairs in the ‘business’ area of the ship. They nodded curtly to each other in greeting as the doors hissed open and then shut behind the younger man. Derek pulled up a chair and crossed his arms, his eyes adjusting quickly to the aerodynamic, sterile brightness of the boardroom.

“The rest of your department should be joining us soon, Hale,” Argent said, his tone of voice almost conversational, if, in the years Derek had been with the force, he hadn’t learnt that Chris Argent didn’t _do_ idle conversations. Not with his Division, at least. Though his interactions with himself and the rest of his regiment were carefully neutral, Derek was under no false impression that Argent, like many others aboard ARGUS and even back home, retained a deep-seated distrust for Lycans. Never mind that his team, however small, was considered the ‘best-of-the-best’, the finest team of super-human soldiers available to ARGUS. Few Lycans enlisted in the Force, even fewer were inducted as a familial unit. The Hales were ARGUS’ Lycan Division, a small yet effective team, which headed most of the missions with their superior reflexes. Despite Argent assigned as the Sub-Director of the Force, the head of ARGUS, Derek took his orders from only one individual – his squadron Alpha, Laura, his older sister.

It seemed as though the mere thought of her acted as a summoning, because the Meeting Room doors hissed open and Laura walked in, followed closely by Peter, head tactician of their unit and their uncle. Peter walked past his chair and brushed his hip against Derek’s arm, before taking a seat opposite. Laura sat beside Derek, pressing a hand to his bare shoulder. The natural, tactile nature of Lycans held a strong connection with physical contact, and even those light touches of his family, as brief as they were, helped settle his discomfited disposition. Both she and Peter were wearing the full Nauts uniform, the polished cut of their black jackets streamlined, exhibiting the sleek, powerful musculatures of trained soldiers. Clad in his dark military training cargos and a worn singlet, Derek felt supremely underdressed and not the least bit comfortable.

“I’m glad you three could make it,” Argent began, seating himself at the head of the table and leafing through a sheaf of papers. His posture was straight, his face and crystalline-blue eyes devoid of emotions – even his scent yielded no discernable emotion. He was good at what he did, held an excellent poker-face, and Derek didn’t trust him one bit. “We’ve received a mission from HQ, one that we’ve discussed at length, in which your Division would be perfect for – Derek, in particular.”

“What sort of mission are we talking about?” Laura asked, settling her elbows on the table and leaning forward, her dark hair pulled back from her keen eyes, giving her fine features a sharp, cunning edge.

“Simple recon, from the sounds of it,” Argent spoke, his heartbeat completely steady, no detection of falsehood. “We’re still waiting on one more person, but from the paperwork, it appears to be a simple retrieval mission. Fly in, retrieve intel, and fly out.”

“So why involve Derek?” Peter asked, his casual tone belying the keenness of his mind as he steepled his fingers together. “Simple recon shouldn’t necessitate the use of one of your Lycan Nauts. So why assign a Lycan in particular, when a regular Naut would do?”

“It appears that the reason they chose Derek in particular for this mission is because of, ah,” he flicked past another page on his dossier, then settled the clipboard down and smiled what Laura had dubbed his ‘Insurance Salesman’ smile – the smile of a man who was attempting to sell an unsavory situation as diplomatically as possible, “Derek’s… _reluctance_ to work with an AI.”

“I won’t work with ‘em,” Derek growled, feeling a hot rush of anger spike through his body. The presence of his sister beside him was reassuring, and held most of his anger back. However, the constant pressure from ‘up above’ to force an AI partner on him, well, it was starting to wear thin.

“Neither Laura or Peter have AIs,” he sneered, arms still crossed tightly in front of him.

“Though that may be true, Derek, neither of your family members are regulars on the field,” Argent reasoned, “If you really want to dissect the situation, neither your sister or your uncle have set foot on the front line since the beginning. Laura has been a vital asset to our engineering department, and Peter’s contributions to the data and planning sector of ARGUS has been indispensable.”

The doors behind them whirred open, and a young man in a crisp, pristine lab coat stepped through, his dark eyes crinkled in mirth, dimples set deeply into his cheeks and exuding an air of cordiality. Derek’s guard refused to come down, despite knowing the other man to be no threat.

“This is Doctor Daniel Mahealani, head of the AI Division,” Argent introduced him, shaking the man’s hand.

“We’ve met,” he remarked dryly, remembering with distaste the countless times he’d been herded into the labs, had his physical and mental aptitude tests resurfaced and combed through again, refreshed and commented on while they ran him through the basic instructions for operating with an AI unit for the umpteenth time. It hadn’t been his fault that, in the near half dozen years of service, he hadn’t been able to build a proper, functioning working relationship with any one of the units they’d provided him with. “And, if Doctor Mahealani recalls, I’m not a fan of AIs.”

“It is understandable to feel frustration at having a digital partner when you are in possession of naturally superior capabilities, especially in comparison to other Nauts,” the doctor spoke, his hands tucked into the pockets of his coat, “Despite your exceptional proficiency, Derek, you remain an anomaly in our system. Every single Naut on our ship, in the corporation, has their own AI.”

“Not this drivel again,” Peter bemoaned, rolling his eyes heavenwards and leaning back into his chair.

“Why are you so adamant to saddle my brother with an AI against his wishes?” Laura asked, her face and tone of voice devoid of any real emotion, but the undercurrent of an irritated inquisition underneath. “Our unit works fine without one, as we’ve argued multiple times in front of the board at HQ. Each of our members works in synchronicity with the other far better than a regular human unit would. We each have our assigned strengths-”

“Command-” Peter pointed to Laura, “- Brains,” he pointed to his skull with a satisfied smirk, “-And the brawn,” he finally gestured at Derek, still tight-lipped with irritation.

“- which, though seen as unconventional to some, works for us,” Laura continued, seemingly unfazed about the interruption from her uncle. “As it stands, we barely have any interactions with the human Naut departments in the field as is.”

“I’m sure Derek’s heard all the info about AIs multiple times, Danny,” Peter drawled, motioning flippantly to the young man in the coat, “But enlighten us, if you will, on why you deem it so _important_ for my nephew to have one.”

“Well, as you know,” the scientist began, taking an empty chair in hand and seating himself across the desk, “An AI unit has been deemed an integral component to a Naut’s equipment.”

“Start at the beginning, doc, and try not to confuse me,” Peter smirked, earning him a sharp look from Laura.

“Very well. The Artificial Intelligence unit, or AI, was invented by ARGUS to act as somewhat partner to the soldier. Their creation is immeasurably complex - instead of simply programming a smart AI, the AI matrix is actually partially created by sending electrical bursts through the neural pathways of a human brain. This is then replicated in a superconducting nano-assemblage known as Cognitive Impression Modelling. Additional software programming is then built up on top of the bare bones of the program, which creates unique software with the capabilities of expanding its knowledge. In short, it is a program which evolves with information, learns, and is more adaptable to change from personal experience.”

“What is the purpose of pairing an AI to a Naut, then?” Laura asked, her expression curious.

“Simple,” Danny nodded his head, turning his face towards her. “AIs and their Central Processing Unit chips, or CPU chips, are removable, and when engaged, stored in-mission inside the Naut’s suit to collaborate with the Naut on a closer level.”

“Glorified electronic babysitters,” Derek grunted, already tired of this shit.

“An AI is more than a babysitter, Derek,” the scientist spoke, his voice irritatingly patient and grating against Derek’s already frayed nerves, “AI’s and Nauts are intended to have a close working relationship, and, through this, an exceptionally intimate bond. A Naut and his AI have a closer rapport than with his fellow team members. Because of their bond, the AI is considered one of the paramount pieces of equipment on a mission. Long exposures to their partner means that the AI collects data on their assigned Naut. They can interpret their reaction times to stimuli, speeds, and so forth, and then calculate diagnostic matrixes that help in guiding them through battle and difficult situations with military precision. They act as a sort of – how shall I put this – a guide, if you will, a working partner whose ability to process dangers and missions is of the highest caliber.”

“I’ve got to say, an AI companion doesn’t sound at all bad when put that way,” Laura mused, leaning on her elbow and looking over at Derek, though not addressing him. Derek was starting to feel mighty sick of people talking about him as if he wasn’t there. “I suppose Derek never really clicked with a unit, though. Surely it’s not an issue if he _doesn’t_ have one, right?”

“Derek’s unique reluctance to work with an AI has been a fascinating study, to say the least.” He leaned back in his chair and smiled at Derek, a smile he didn’t return. “Lycans wouldn’t need to rely on an AI nearly as heavily as human Nauts, what with superior reflexes and all. While AIs are relatively inexpensive to create, it is the rigorous training programs and simulations that they are run through to garner experience to work in the field that makes them so costly. They become more advanced and valuable as their years in action expand its knowledge, and it grows and develops into an advanced, inimitable system.”

“So, in essence, an AI is also a tactical aid?” Peter commented.

“Precisely. Each AI is different, and in possession of a diverse ‘personality’, as unique as their experience on various missions and paired with their Naut partner. This is a fail-safe system implemented by ARGUS, which makes them varied enough that enemies cannot predict their reactions to situations. Now, in Derek’s case,” he motioned with a hand to Derek, who, until then, had largely been ignored (and it took all his self-control not to bare his teeth at the young scientist), “his hesitancy to work with an AI caused quite a discussion between us. You see, Derek has worked in the force for numerous years, and yet has not held an AI partner long enough to build any type of rapport with. Tell me, Derek, how do you feel about the AIs you were assigned before?”

“I couldn’t stand them,” Derek answered, unhappy that his feelings weren’t even getting a say in the matter, save for scientific observation. As if his emotions were a _specimen_ to be observed in a petri dish under a microscope, rather than accepted.

“And why is that?” Danny prompted.

“Because they undermined my decisions,” he growled in response, ignoring the warning look his sister shot his way to curb his rising temper. “Anything I did, they second-guessed and called into question, reported back to ARGUS. Lycan Nauts are different from humans, we trust our _instincts_.”

“And the AIs you were partnered with did not agree with you on your courses of action?”

“It was ‘ _numerical improbability_ ’ this and ‘ _success rate_ ’ that. I train myself hard to be in peak physical condition. My reflexes are ten times better than anybody else’s. I didn’t need some disembodied voice in my suit telling me what I could and couldn’t do.” He paused a moment, then added, “And I don’t trust them enough to give me advice.”

“I’m sorry – did Derek just say ‘disembodied voice’?” Laura asked, one of her perfectly-groomed brows inching higher.

“An AI manifests itself either through a voice in the suit of the Naut when in-mission, or by a holographic representation of itself from the surface of the CPU chip.” Danny explained. “They’re responsible not only for data collection and storage, but also for communications between the Nauts and the ARGUS, providing their assigned Naut with mission briefings, relevant information and tactical intelligence, and also monitoring their vitals through the suit. They can also aid the Naut by, for example, regulating the temperature inside their suit for optimal performance, or by activating the medical-aid function if the aforementioned soldier is paralyzed, blacked out, or unable to activate the function themselves. Many lives have been saved on the field with the help of AIs.”

“I’ve seen a few AIs myself, though,” Peter mused, tapping his chin with a finger. “Well, not on the field, of course, because I’m smart enough to not get involved in any conflict that doesn’t involve topographic digital raster maps, or gestural interface screens. Dermott in Planning has one,” he motioned vaguely to Derek, who had no clue who the fuck Dermott was supposed to _be_. “His AI isn’t in a chip or hologram, though. She’s actually a rather attractive brunette. Stunning eyes.”

“That would be Michelle, wearing her android suit,” Danny smiled. “I perform maintenance on all high-level AIs myself. AIs come in two grades – your standard Assist AI, which is what Officer Dermott has, and the Military AIs, which are on a much higher caliber of functioning than the former. Military AIs aren’t assigned android shells, they remain in chip form, or inside the Naut’s suit.”

“That would explain why we haven’t seen any of the other Naut units with an android AI following them around,” Laura observed.

“Precisely. Assist AIs and Military AIs are interchangeable, of course, being based on the same CPU outputs, but Military AIs are much better suited to the field. When not used in a mission or on the front line, an AI chip can either be stored inside the suit, or transferred into an assistance-type android body that can cohabitate the Officer or Naut’s living space and assist them in various ways. Michelle is a fantastic help for Officer Dermott, since he always seems to lose his glasses.” He chuckled, unfazed that only Peter seemed to find the situation humorous. “ARGUS has a multitude of android bodies. They range from completely cyborg shells, like the ones you see in the mess hall that prepare our meals, to near-perfect human-looking androids.”

“Michelle,” Peter prompted. “I picked up that she wasn’t entirely human, but even my own senses were fooled – she smelled human to me. If I hadn’t seen Dermott temporarily put her in sleep-mode for maintenance, I wouldn’t have guessed.”

“Science has come a long, long way from the early days of robotics. We’ve replicated the human body almost perfectly into androids, with synthetic tissues, organs and hairs, a nervous system, even a proper circulatory and digestive system. They can eat, defecate, sleep and even bleed.” Danny’s chin lifted as he spoke, sounding proud. “You see, the cyborg androids are handy for menial tasks, but it’s the humanoid ones that are most useful. They’re used by ARGUS in many spy and infiltrating missions. Their appearance, combined with the carbon-based replication technology available to us, which means very few mechanical parts, makes it difficult for enemies – and seemingly Lycans, too – to detect. There are probably soldiers out in the barracks with more mechanical prosthetics in their bodies than our androids. AIs, especially ones that have been on the field or operational for a number of years, are especially proficient at operating these almost-human androids. Their experiences and training have made them ideal to move as programmed for them.”

“I think that’s more than enough technical mumbo-jumbo for my head today,” Laura sighed through pursed lips, rubbing at her temples with her fingertips. “I have to say, an AI companion sounds like a good thing to have. But with my brother’s-” she shot a quick, almost apologetic glance to Derek, “- _headstrong_ nature, I can see why it wouldn’t work.”

“And I believe we’ve found a solution to the problem at hand,” Danny pulled out a flat, gunmetal-colored rectangular box from the inside pocket of his coat, about three inches wide and barely an inch thick. Derek couldn’t help his eyes from narrowing in dislike – he knew very well what lay inside the metallic capsule.

“Is that an AI?” Laura asked, her face quizzical as Danny opened the container and laid it open between them on the smooth surface of the white meeting table. Nestled neatly in laser-cut EVA packing foam lay an AI chip, identical to the other five they’d attempted to saddle Derek with before. “It’s – well, I’m not going to lie, it’s smaller and less assuming than I would have thought.” His sister wasn’t wrong. For the entire technological marvel an AI was lauded to be, the chip was a tiny, seemingly fragile-looking thing. Two and a half inches long, two wide and barely a quarter inch thick, it was smooth and streamlined, with the ARGUS logo emblazoned on the front, any details on its façade solely for aesthetic purposes.

“This is a fully functioning Military-standard AI housed in its CPU chip, a feat of technological marvel. When you see an android walking around, this is what’s at their core – their soul, if you will.” Danny grinned, dimples set deep in his cheeks. “The First Computer weighed 30 tons, took up 1800 square feet, and consumed 150 kilowatts. Technology has improved at an almost exponential rate since then. Don’t let its size fool you, they’re powerful things with innumerable uses.”

“What makes you think that this AI in particular is going to pass Derek’s scrutiny?” Peter asked, doubt layering his voice.

“The issue of Derek’s partners has been a concern of ours for some time,” Danny said. He finally turned to Derek, his dark, merry eyes settling over him. “How many years have you been in the force for, Derek?”

“Six years,” he replied. “Two in training, four full-time in the field. All at ARGUS.”

“Are you aware that Nauts only need serve a maximum of seven years?”

“Derek has expressed his inclination to remain with ARGUS for longer than the requisite seven years,” Chris voiced.

“We plan to extend our terms for longer as well,” Laura added. “We work together well as a team – we don’t see why our services wouldn’t be useful after a prerequisite amount of years. The three of us discussed this at great length – we believe we’d be useful for another four years at least.”

“I see,” Danny mused. “What I believe has happened is that Derek has been assigned new AIs to work with, which is probably why he feels uncomfortable partnering with them.”

“So you’re saying that I’ve been designated amateur, inexperienced chunks of software?” Derek growled, his brows furrowed with barely-repressed anger. To think they would entrust a Naut, a Lycan one at that, with a piece of equipment that hadn’t properly been field-tested yet.

“The AIs are hardly inexperienced,” the young scientist answered, “Once created, AIs are put through rigorous training programs and simulations designed to reflect real scenarios on the battlefield. That’s where most of the AI budget actually goes. They garner experience to work properly on the field, that’s one of the reasons they’re so costly. It is my belief that the previous AIs assigned to you have not received enough Naut interaction, and therefore have little to no experience in how to collaborate together with a Naut that has such a strong-willed disposition. Which is where this little guy comes in.” He smiled warmly down at the chip, silent and immobile in its foam packing. “One of our previous Nauts from a sister-ship had him for quite some time, built a good rapport with him, too. Incidentally, he was also a Lycan Naut, so he’s not new to the idiosyncrasies and mannerisms of your type of soldiers. I think he’d be a good partner for you, Derek. I’m pretty attached to him myself.”

With careful fingers, he reached out, extricated the chip from the its packing and laid it on the table. He pressed a seemingly-invisible keypad upon its surface, the numbers flashing white momentarily under his fingertips. The chip’s circular center glowed bright for an instant, and then a faint halogen light flared from within. With a barely-audible hum, even to sensitive Lycan ears, a figure took shape in the holographic glow, standing less than a hand-span tall. It straightened its spine and squared its shoulders, its back to them as it faced Danny.

“Heya, boss-man. How’s it shakin’?”

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Derek muttered, feeling his stomach drop.

“Derek, meet Stiles, your new AI partner.”

The AI turned around on the spot, finally meeting them. Derek’s eyebrows rose in surprise. His AI holographic images had all been varied, from young-ish-looking women and men, but this one’s interface just looked – _boyish_. Like all AIs, he was bare-skinned, though there were no signs of genitalia visible. His skin was an iridescent sky-blue, covered in a fine mesh of polychromatic, gleaming formations of darker cobalt circuitry, which shimmered brightly to white every so often up and down his limbs, effectively tracing patterns that semi-resembled a skin-suit. His body was lean, with wide shoulders and a slim waist, and his hair was cropped short and seemed to stick up in an odd, almost messy direction. His features looked quick-witted and clever, with a turned up nose and wide eyes, a hint of mischief turning up one corner of his mouth.

Derek’s scowl deepened. The AI looked less like a military tactical aid and more like a wayward teenager.

“What the hell kind of a name is Stiles?” he asked.

“You know, a series of sounds spoken in a particular sequence that represent my identity, primarily, referring to me?“ the AI – _Stiles_ – answered cheekily, crossing his own arms in front of his chest, mirroring Derek’s position.

“Ooh, this one’s _feisty_ ,” Peter smirked.

“AIs are usually designated a number code to their identities, though their Nauts can appoint them with a personalized moniker,” Danny grinned, “Though this guy is a little unique. He named himself.” He shook his head with seemingly fond exasperation.

“Stiles, short for _Specialized Technical Intelligence and Logistics for Earth and Space_. Thought it had a neat ring to it. I tweaked my base state parameters a little,” Stiles grinned. “My original assigned name was in Polish. Too many consonants to be comfortable.” His grin seemed infectious, making even Laura’s lips quirk up. Derek, however, remained impassive.

“So you’re expecting me to head into missions with _this_ ,” he jabbed a broad finger at the holographic projection on the table in front of him with a distaste he could not suppress. “I might as well charge into gunfire without a suit, a full 300 cc of wolfsbane solution in my bloodstream, hands tied behind my back and blindfolded, for all the use he’ll be.”

“I’ll have you _know_ ,” Stiles stiffened on his chip platform, his demeanor serious, “that I was considered the best in my entire division. My former Naut was elected squadron leader within three years thanks to working together with me. My ability to process information and deliver instructions is second-to-none. My only question is,” he cocked a semi-transparent eyebrow at Derek, which in turn made his pulse spike with irritation, “what makes you think _you’re_ qualified enough to work with _me_?”

“Oh, this is going to be _good_ ,” Peter grinned, failing to cover his amusement behind his gloved hand.

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wahey! New chapter! :D Sorry about the lateness, guys!
> 
> Stiles is a bit of a brat, but he has some pretty good taste in music! If you're interested in his 'atmospherical music to kick ass to' to 'get your blood pumping', just click on the links as you come across them in the fic!
> 
> Also updated the beginning of the fic with [Duckhymn's](http://duckhymn.tumblr.com) beautiful artwork I commissioned for this story. Go check out its majesty!

The longest period of time Derek had been able to keep an AI had been close to two weeks. Of course, it hadn’t helped that he’d been assigned the unit just before a long assignment, and the only reason it had gone on for so long was because he couldn’t abandon the thing mid-mission. Not that he hadn’t been sorely tempted to, but it was against policy to leave equipment behind. That, and Commander Argent had threatened to downgrade him to cleaning duty for the remainder of his service.

Derek trudged through the corridors of the barracks, clutching the activated AI in his hand. Now that Danny had turned it to operational mode, there wasn’t any way he could switch the damn thing off. Which was why the AI – Stiles, what the hell kind of a name was that? – was currently hovering an inch or two above the chip, talking his ear off.

That was one of the biggest differences between his previous AI partners and Stiles. His former partners had been quiet, subservient, professional enough to border on cold. But Stiles talked incessantly about anything between his personal opinion on the nutritional value of the cafeteria’s food (“Questionable at best – I understand they balance it nutritionally to have everything you need, but is that even a good thing considering the human body needs variety?”) to his personal experience on the training grounds.

Which is where they were headed now. Commander Argent had insisted they run through at least two weeks of modulations together before undertaking the recon. Something about getting used to working as a team, strengthening their bonds. His pace was brisk and efficient as he strode to the training rooms, the AI circuit cradled in the palm of his hand.

Derek wished, not for the first time that day (and probably many more times to come in the future) that the AI had a corporeal body, if only so he could wrap his hands around that neck and shake him. Somehow end that jaw-grinding incessant babble before he willingly deployed the airlock and voluntarily sucked himself out into the deep, endless confines of space, just to get some peace.

“Don’t you ever stop talking?” he gritted out between clenched teeth, his boots echoing their heavy stomp across the polished floor. The glowing figure standing atop of the flat surface of the chip half-turned towards him and cocked an eyebrow, seemingly amused at Derek’s irritated mood.

“You seemed like such an effusive character, Naut Hale, that it seemed only natural for me to pick up the slack,” he replied, his tone mischievous. “I noticed that right after our little introduction, you seemed to withdraw from the conversation entirely. Not that I couldn’t speak enough for the both of us, but since we’ll be spending extended periods of time in each other’s company, I thought an easy conversation about nothing of relevance could loosen us up. Get to know each other, mano a mano. You know. Except, since I’ll be invading your personal space and cabin, it’s more a case of tu casa es mi casa.” He winked and made a clicking sound with his mouth pulled to the side, cocking – oh, lord – finger guns at him, of all things. “So, Captain my Captain, wanna open up with something? What tale of interest will you regale us with? My ears are open, fire away.”

Unwilling to play along to Stiles’ banter, Derek chose to reply with an inexpressive grunt. Perhaps Stiles would grow uncomfortable with his abrupt manner, like his previous two had, and would leave him alone. It was a small, ineffectual hope, but he carried it nevertheless.

“Aaaaaand we’re reduced to monosyllabic grunts,” Stiles chirped in reply, seemingly unaffected by Derek’s dour face. “I know most Nauts aren’t the chatty type, but my experience with Lycan Nauts hadn’t extended to the Cro-Magnon variety.”

They reached the training grounds and not a moment too soon in Derek’s opinion – corporeal or not, the temptation was to shove that chatty chip down the garbage disposal chute, consequences be damned. Instead, he kept his stoic silence, even as the twin technicians Ethan and Aiden (whose last name nobody seemed to know) helped suit him up.

“This is rare, setting you up in a simulator with an AI,” Deaton, the Training Manager, commented idly as he jotted something indecipherable on a clipboard. “It’s been a while since we’ve seen you around these parts. Commander Argent was very specific in his requests. We’re setting you up in Module 8B, with the Vu.”

“Oh, I like 8B,” Stiles commented happily, shining off the surface of the chip that had been placed on the table beside Derek, along with each piece of the tactical armor as Ethan (or Aiden) strapped him in, while the other followed behind. Working in an easy, tandem rhythm borne of years of practice, they efficiently rigged Derek’s armor and activated the circuitry, and then stepped back once their job was complete. With a satisfying clunk, the suit powered up, the solid plates molded to Derek’s physique and humming almost imperceptibly with activated energy. He hauled the helmet up into his gloved hands and settled it securely over his head, the visor in front of his eyes booting up into its regular start-up screen mode, before turning almost-clear. Derek had an unobstructed view from inside his helmet now. The suit contained enough energy from its built-in power supply to last a full week of constant use before needing charge form an external source. The live-data feeds displaying inside the helmet had been annoying at first, but years of being on the force had conditioned him against getting distracted by the flashing, ever-changing numeric functions in front of his eyes.

"You’ve had experience with an AI in the field before," Deaton spoke, eyes still glued to the statistics on the keyboard. "Obviously, we don’t need to give you the run-down on how they operate, or how they synch with the digital parameters of the suit, correct?"

"Plug me in, doc. I am ready to roll!" Stiles grinned, rubbing his hands together in front of him eagerly. Apparently satisfied with whatever notes he’d written, Deaton put his clipboard down on the table’s surface and picked up the circuitry between his fingers. With a pleased exclamation of _‘Finally!’_ , Stiles’ holographic form flickered out of sight, the diode display still glowing brightly on the chip’s surface.

Derek tried not to pull a displeased face as Deaton slid the microprocessor into place through a fine slot on the front of his suit. Located just beneath his breastbone, it was essentially inserted into the ‘heart’ of his suit. Poetic irony aside, it was where the majority of the armor’s control functions were located, and, when inserted, the circuit was technically hard-wired with the suit. All actions undertaken by the AI control would take nanoseconds to execute. “Feels good to be back in a Naut suit,” Stiles hummed happily from within the helmet’s speakers, so close that he might as well have been talking into Derek’s ear. That is, if he were human, and not just a fabricated entity. “How you doing, grumpy-gills? Hear me loud and clear?”

“Unfortunately,” he replied, his jaw set with barely-repressed irritation.

“Neat! Let’s rumba, then. Kick that simulator’s backside. Give ‘em the old one-two. Show ‘em what’s for.”

If he gripped the pistol grip of his simulation ray-emission pistol with a little more force than was strictly necessary, well, that was nobody’s business but his own.

  


 

“That was, without a doubt, the _worst_ battle simulator experience I have ever had the misfortune of seeing in my entire military career,” Peter chuckled with good humor, setting down his tray at Derek’s table in the mess hall. Derek didn’t even spare him a glance, but dug into his steak with such viciousness that the tines of his fork bent. Of _course_ Peter, of all people, had been in the simulator’s office with Deaton to run diagnostics when Derek had gone in with Stiles.

“I’m sure it couldn’t have been that bad, Peter,” Laura admonished, tucking a strand of dark hair behind her ear and spearing a tube of cheesy macaroni on the end of her fork. That was one of the many blessings of being a Lycan that she used to her advantage – a metabolism so fast that, short of eating a literal metric ton of food, there was hardly any effect on their body. Laura exploited it to her full extent, eating enough greasy, salty garbage to incapacitate a small army of obese truck-drivers. And Derek? He hid his ravaging sweet-tooth better than Smaug hid the Arkenstone beneath his large, scaly bosom.

Not that either of his family members would get that reference. Philistines.

“My only regret is only being aware of the hilarity in the final few minutes of the simulation,” Peter sighed dramatically, gesticulating with an asparagus spear. “Would have made a nice addition to the family album, is all. Although I _did_ manage to record this spectacular little gem from the audio. Take a listen.” He pulled out his mini-computer and booted up the sound file, the volume low enough for the three Lycans to hear, but none of the surrounding tables, Stiles’ voice coming out slightly tinny from the speakers.

_“-- Oh my GOD. Didn’t you hear me say veer right? Veer RIGHT. YOUR RIGHT, STAGE LEFT. You’re not even heading anywhere remotely to the right! You're supposed to be this awesome super fighter and you can't even-- YOU JUST MISSED! IT WAS RIGHT THERE! -- Oh wait. Woah, woah. That's a grenade. Derek, wait, back up. We're in a hallway, don't you know what the blast diameter of that thing is? That'd blow us to bits! HEY! HEY! ARE YOU LISTENING, I SAID DON'T THROW-- Aaaaand, you threw it...”_

Derek pointedly ignored both family members, now bent over their trays and laughing into their hands, and _especially_ the hand-sized holographic AI standing on the chip on the table beside his personal gear, arms crossed and glowering ferociously. Despite running his mouth off practically non-stop for the entire hour, he was being disarmingly reticent about the situation. His meal finished, Derek pushed his metal tray away and wordlessly strapped the newly-acquired ChipGuard around his wrist, securing the band in place with the Velcro end. The chip slid into a small compartment with a lightweight, plexiglass shield, constructed thinly to let the AI’s hologram pass through, but built strong enough to ensure minimal damage to the microprocessor throughout Derek’s day-to-day living.

Another hardship to endure in the long, long list of inconveniences that came with having an AI. Once activated, their battery life lasted something like a million years (citation needed), but by law the Nauts were required to keep the AI on them at all times. The only small comfort that came with that was that, in motion, Stiles’ AI holograph was disabled. It was a shame the motion-sensors couldn’t disable his voice, too. Finished with dinner, he picked up the tray, nodded curtly to Peter and a little more warmly to Laura, who brushed her fingers against his elbow in an encouraging, if somewhat placating, manner. Depositing his tray at the allocated slot to be cleaned, he trudged back through the hallways of the ARGUS, steering clear of other personnel until he reached his quarters. He wanted nothing more than to put this debacle of a day behind him, enter the private sanctum of his room, complete his evening workout routine, shower and sleep. Except that now, with an AI, it wasn’t private anymore.

The door closed behind him, and Derek rubbed a broad-ﬁngered hand over his face, feeling exhausted and fed up. He was half-tempted to forego ﬁnishing his exercises completely for the night, but he knew that he was trying to justify his laziness. As many advantages that came from being a natural-born Lycan, his physique and strength came from putting in the hard work. Shedding his shirt and ﬂinging it in the general direction of his laundry hamper, he toed off his boots and gripped the pull up bar suspended in the air in the doorway to the bathroom, resuming his chin-ups from the morning. The cabin remained blissfully quiet for a while, the silence punctuated only by the grunts of exertion that came every so often. The ChipGuard on his wrist emitted its usual muted glow, the AI being blissfully, uncharacteristically quiet. If Derek hadn't known better, he would have said it - he? - was sulking. But AIs weren't human, and therefore didn't possess the ability to sulk.

Derek had no reason to feel guilty, or to answer to a gloriﬁed circuitry board.

"You didn't listen to me," Stiles spoke, an hour later when Derek had unstrapped the ChipGuard and laid it ﬂat on the bathroom counter, nestled amongst his sleep gear as he ducked into the shower. Parted from the AI's accusing glare by the shower curtain, Derek freely rolled his eyes and lathered up under the hot spray of water. He refused to acknowledge the other's words, settling on a noncommittal grunt as a reply.

"I know you're one of those less-talk, more-action types, but your nonverbal communication thing is starting to get old already," Stiles continued, his tone conversational. Switching the shower off, Derek ﬂung back the curtains and was greeted by the tiny form glowing above the ChipGuard, hands propped on hips and face unimpressed. "You're not stupid, and this 'lone-wolf' persona you're giving off is pretty unprofessional. So how come you refused to acknowledge my input and continued with the simulation like that?"

"We won in the end, didn't we?" Derek mumbled back, drying off and pulling the sweats up over his hips. It had been a close shave, but the ofﬁcial tally score had marked his mission as successful.

"That's not the point of the exercise, Hale!" Stiles squawked, his holographic persona vanishing the moment the Naut picked up the wrist-strap. The voice continued to emit from the chip as he tugged it on, though, admonishing. "The injuries you sustained were hardly ideal."

"I'm a Lycan - I would have healed fast."

"Once again, not the point. Do you even know the meaning of teamwork? Genetically-superior brawn and reﬂexes aside, an AI is supposed to have two main objectives -" Derek rolled his eyes and padded back to the main cabin, ready for bed, "- that is, completing the mission successfully and maintaining the health and well-being of their Naut. It's a partnership; I'm supposed to help you out there! You take way too many risks."

"Whatever," he grunted, dimming the lights in the room to nothing and climbing onto his cot. "Are you gonna blab all night, or let me get some rest? We have a whole week of repeating these fiascoes ahead of us, and unlike some objects that can recharge at a moment’s notice, I need some sleep."

"Whatever indeed," Stiles snapped primly, and if Derek punched his pillow a little harder than normal to ﬂuff it, well, that was nobody's business but his own.

  


 

Their second day was spent acquainting Stiles to Derek's armor suit. Stiles, who boasted plenty of experience with Naut gear, was surprisingly adept. He'd conﬁgured the circuitry to his own personal tastes, whatever those seemed to be, and, under Deaton's watchful eye, ran through each of the suit's functions with the practiced ease of someone who'd been doing it for years. According to Danny's notes, Stiles' previous Naut, a Lycan much like him, had used the same type of protective covering.

Whatever relief Derek had felt knowing that his AI at least had prior knowledge of his suit evaporated the instant he set foot into the simulator. Three steps into the virtual-reality matrix construction of Module 9B, and Derek was suddenly struck with the impression that something had broken inside his suit. The strange mechanical clunks rolled through his headset, even when his steps faltered and stopped altogether. His mind racing overtime, he counted the clunking sounds, one after another, six in total before - two beats that sounded uncannily like two beats of - cymbals - ?

"Oh, you've got to be _joking_!" Derek snarled, as the opening guitar riff of [_Back in Black_](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pAgnJDJN4VA) began thumping through the headset of his helmet.

"Perfect atmospherical music to kick ass to! Get your blood pumping!" Stiles laughed from inside the suit somewhere, voice full of mirth. “People say my music taste is awful, but you can’t argue with the classics!”

“Turn this garbage _off_!” Derek shouted over the music, trying desperately to get his anger back in control as he gathered his bearings.

“ _Scott_ always found my music inspirational,” Stiles groused, his voice dropping into a huff. The music persisted, annoyingly enough, even as Derek asked (almost nicely) twice more before threatening to eject the chip and smash it to pieces under the sole of his boot. The simulation was similar to their first, with Stiles voicing his opinions (too loudly) and _insisting_ on his so-called ‘ambience music’. And, to be honest, the guy was really throwing Derek off his game. More than once, the AI offered up snarkily-toned statistics and orders – _orders!_ – where all the AIs before had made meek suggestions at best.

The only respite throughout the entire module was when Stiles demanded he take a slightly evasive maneuver in a tight spot, which he’d planned to execute anyway. Gritting his teeth, Derek twisted awkwardly under a scaffolding, evading the digitalized Vu that had materialized from seemingly nowhere, and hadn’t given him any time to react with anything more than a quick dive behind a covered area. It just so happened that Stiles had suggested the same course of action, and crowed enthusiastically at having his instructions followed.

“That’s awesome! Look how great you moved, Derek!” he enthused, genuine pleasure coloring his voice. “The calculation of that dive was spot-on! What’s next?”

“Thought I’d take out the one on the right,” Derek replied automatically, surprising himself with having actually answered Stiles.

“Yeah, great idea – it’s broken away from the rest of the group. Picking them off one by one, huh? I like your style! Alright – judging by his trajectory, give it 2.4 seconds and then duck out and shoot him.”

“If you say so,” Derek replied sarcastically, having intended to come out sooner and fire. The outcome from Stiles’ prediction piqued Derek’s curiosity, however, and after all, it was a simulation – nothing really to lose if something went wrong. And, he reasoned to himself, he couldn’t really do worse than yesterday’s trial run, which he was most definitely still smarting about. He waited for Stiles’ signal, then quickly sidestepped and fired his pistol. The Vu (or the programmed simulation of the Vu anyway) was caught off-guard and dropped soundlessly, far easier than he’d expected it to be.

“Great shot!” Stiles whooped, “Let’s go get the rest!”

Derek rolled his eyes as Stiles began blasting [_Eye of the Tiger_](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btPJPFnesV4) through the speakers.

 

 

Derek disliked changes, especially one so close to the core, one which affected him so personally. Stiles’ enthusiasm never seemed to wane after their second module. If anything, his fervor seemed to increase with every passing hour. When confronted about this (“Don’t you _ever_ stop talking?” Derek asked, exasperated), Stiles had merely puffed his chest up with pride, overlooking the three Hales at their dinner table like a lord surveying his kingdom.

“It’s difficult not to boast when you’re one-of-a-kind,” Stiles preened, standing atop of his glowing chip and looking smug. “Not that my self-changed parameters, shining personality and affinity to Lycan Nauts are headline news, but I think Derek and I are gonna get along just fine, especially after that last simulation.”

“Probably a fluke,” Derek grumbled noncommittally, chewing his raw carrot with disinterest.

“Hardly,” Stiles scoffed, rolling on the balls of his holographic feet. “After the first simulator disaster, I made sure to reevaluate my research. The file I’ve compiled on your tactics in my drives is quite extensive now.”

“You went through my prior mission files?” the Naut asked, outraged.

“Of course!” the little blue bastard replied, blinking innocently, an act that Derek didn’t buy for a nanosecond. “I don’t know what kind of loser AI partners you had before, but it’s pretty common for us to have a file of our Naut’s statistics collected in our database.”

“I thought files of previous mission stats were supposed to be private, and only accessible to authorized personnel,” Laura smirked, trying (and failing miserably) to hide her amusement. Peter didn’t even try, the damn asshole, openly snickering into his noodles.

“Well, yes, technically some are,” the AI reasoned, his speech slightly halting, chewing on the facsimile of his bottom lip almost nervously. Derek squinted, and he could have _sworn_ that Stiles’ face had flushed a slightly deeper shade of blue. “But they say a more informed AI is a much better partner in the field.”

“You hacked into the ARGUS server mainframe because you’re a nosy busybody, you mean,” Peter countered, fiddling with his metal chopsticks. Under Derek’s disapproving gaze, Stiles’ mouth twisted into a scowl, but the tips of his tiny ears turned a dark blue, almost as dark as the digital pathways etched on his skin. Derek scoffed, turning his eyes away to focus on his dinner and decidedly not finding that cute at _all_.

 

 

Derek took a day off from training. Though he was required by Commander Argent to undergo at least ten training days with the AI before receiving his mission particulars, Derek figured he could take three to four days off in total for the fortnight without repercussions. He wasn’t usually keen on taking time off, and not keeping busy, but with the addition of an AI in his life, his priorities changed. After two solid days of having a noisy chatterbox strapped to his wrist, he figured that taking some time to think about anything – _anything_ – but military tactics was probably in his best interest.

Stiles was – well, he certainly was _different_ , not at all like his previous digital partners. He was a sarcastic, mouthy little shit. He’d hacked into a mainframe _illegally_ to dig up information on Derek, which he was still astounded over (Peter said Stiles had stones – Derek just thought he’d been foolhardy). He’d tried to pick a fight with Greenberg, of all people, who had run into Derek on his way to delivering clean linens to his room, and forgotten to drop off towels. _Greenberg_ , over _towels_.

Derek couldn’t deal with this. He was entertaining himself in the way he knew best - laying on his cot in well-worn, comfortable sweats, pillows bunched behind his shoulders and _Dune_ open against his knees for the eightieth time. If Laura caught his with the severely dog-eared paperback, she’d make fun of him for reading ancient, technologically-inaccurate novels. He didn’t care – the story was good, and that’s all that mattered.

“You’re not _really_ pissed about me downloading your info, are you?” Stiles asked, obviously feeling contrite despite his self-assured, seemingly casual question. His chip (and, by extension, himself) was perched on Derek’s bedside table, watching the idle turning of the pages. Derek spared him an irritated glance, instead saying nothing and focusing on the words typed across the yellowing pages. From the corner of his vision, he could see the AI fidgeting nervously, moving as if he were attempting to say something, and then hesitate, as if rethinking his wording.

“To properly put that into perspective, before you metaphorically hang me out to dry, I think my actions were completely justifiable,“ he continued, though Derek could hear the false bravado in his timbre, “I know how difficult it is to synch with a new partner, especially when someone’s been in the field without one as long as you have. And I know the ‘lone-wolf’ thing has worked for you so far, but a proper working relationship between an AI and a Naut is vital. My last Naut-” His voice halted, which surprised Derek enough to tear his eyes away from the page to look at him. He realized then, with sudden wonder, that he knew nothing of the program’s history, or the background of his previous owner. Not that he was curious, or anything.

“Anyway. I reviewed your history with the previous AIs, combined with your previous mission information and medical records. You seem to have an affinity for taking risks.”

“It gets the job done,” Derek answered, tired of having to repeat himself, to justify his actions.

“Look, I know you don’t like me,” Stiles went on, ignoring Derek’s reply. “And that’s fine. We don’t have to be buddy-buddy to work well together. But I’m not going to creepily mouthbreathe in your ear and dictate how you should move. I wanted an insider’s perspective into how you handle situations with conflict. I _needed_ to know this stuff – this is how I am, and how I prefer to do my research. Besides, what’s a little breach of privacy between friends?”

“So, what, now you’re going to be my best friend in the whole wide world?” Derek drawled with sarcasm.

“Well, maybe not the _whole_ world, but this is a start,”

Stiles returned, the tone of his voice toeing the line between sincere and sardonic, “And I promise that, for as long as you have me as your AI partner, you won’t get caught in some ridiculous situation because of bad planning. The only contingency we’d have to factor in is your own stupidity.”

Derek couldn’t tell whether or not Stiles was being sincere or not anymore.

 

 

Their third training module was a complete disaster, almost as bad as the first. Derek _knew_ their good teamwork the time prior had had to be a chance occurrence, and alright, it was probably his stubbornness that made him refuse Stiles’ instructions and take that wrong turn in the simulated catacombs, which then set off the tripwire and, in turn, triggered a catastrophic series of domino-like misfortunes. Nothing that Derek wouldn’t have (eventually) healed from, but Stiles was pissed afterwards, and refused to talk to him, or any of the Hales, during that evening’s meal. Miraculously, even afterwards when they retired to their (no, _Derek’s_ , not _theirs_ ) room for the evening. If Stiles had been human, Derek would have sworn he was giving him the cold shoulder.

Stiles, he quickly discovered, was prone to bouts of indignant sulking.

Module four was better, probably because Derek scheduled another day off between them, and Stiles had managed to bounce himself back from his moping funk with almost unbridled enthusiasm. Whatever else anybody thought, one couldn’t say that Stiles wasn’t enthusiastic about the possibility of blasting Vu to pieces.

Granted, it could have also had something to do with Laura hissing into his ear that he’d better stop being difficult, unless he wanted to find all his meals laced with medical-grade wolfsbane-infused laxatives. (There weren’t many things Derek was terrified of, but his older sister and her single-minded determination for carrying out threats was one of them). By the time Derek shucked off his boots and headed into the shower to wash off the day’s sweat, Stiles was practically vibrating with contentment.

“We’re still not even close to one hundred percent yet,” Stiles declared through the shower curtain, his chip still stuffed into the ChipGuard thrown haphazardly on top of the pile of dirty clothes on the bathroom shelf. “More like – I dunno, thirty percent? A generous twenty-eight, at least. But I’ll bet you anything that once we get there, we’re gonna be freaking bad-ass. Freaking. _Bad. Ass._ ”

So somewhere between module five and seven, Derek seemed to be getting used to his AI’s quirky behavior. It’s not as if he follows Stiles’ instructions blindly, he’s more independent than that. But Stiles seems to know what he’s doing, more so than any of the other AIs he’s been partnered with in the past. Combined with Derek’s superior abilities, they manage to get through the simulated arenas with greater speed and accuracy than ever before. Derek even manages to beat his own record, which wasn’t anything to sneeze at before. When Stiles comments on Derek’s (apparently) appalling table-manners, he just grunts and shrugs, no longer taking the criticism, as anything more than a smart-alecky comment, while Peter and Laura look on with amused smiles. Their conversations become slightly more two-way streets, though Derek’s really only substituted disinterested noises for single-word replies and Stiles still seems happy enough to commandeer the dialogue on his own.

Stiles is still a pushy, obnoxious little shit. His directions are peppered here and there with sarcasm, and his enthusiasm is, frankly, exhausting after prolonged periods of time.

Though Derek is more than a little surprised when the AI is less than forthcoming in regards to his past, as he found out one evening.

“What happened to your previous Naut?” Derek asked, genuinely interested as he made his cot up with fresh sheets. It had been something he’d been thinking about for some time. It was common knowledge that Nauts’ national service lasted seven years, during which time they only had the one AI at their disposal. Stiles, head and shoulders above any other digital companion saddled on him prior, had obvious hands-on field work. And, despite feigning disinterest, Derek parsed enough information through Stiles’ long-winded tangents in conversation to pick up bits and pieces of his past, mainly the name of the other Naut, a ‘Scott’ from one of their sister vessels.

“Hey dude, your proximity sensors have been giving me grief, it keeps telling me there’s something two meters behind you and slightly to the left, which is total bullshit unless you have some invisible stalker you weren’t planning to tell me about, am I right?” Stiles answered quickly, ostensibly focusing on something else rather than the question posed, “We should probably run those sensors through again before our next trial run, just to fix up that bug. I’ll speak with Deaton about it while you’re getting suited up.”

Derek held his tongue and finished tucking the blankets tightly around the base of his mattress. He could sense an evasion, an unwillingness to talk about something that cut too close to the quick, too deep to the core of an old wound. He kept silent and smoothed the wrinkles from the linens. He guessed something tragic in his past, perhaps Scott had been wounded on the field, or worse – and that was the reason why Stiles was with him now. Regardless of his curiosity, he stopped his unnecessary probing – after all, there were some things even he didn’t want talk about to anybody, especially about his past. Not even to his own family.

 

 

Their eighth simulated battle scenario goes off without a hitch. Each virtual reality battleground had been steadily increasing in difficulty ever since their work methods began synching up and accommodating each other, even if Derek wasn’t planning on being accommodating. Despite trying his hardest to become used to the constantly prattling, annoying little shit, Derek found himself thinking of him as less annoying and more – well, entertaining was a word for it, though he’d never admit to it. Even so, he reminded himself constantly not to establish an attachment with the AI – after all, they were only temporary partners for this mission. It would be ill-advised to form a strong bond, especially if they would part ways once the mission was complete.

He doesn’t trust Stiles entirely. He can count the number of people he can trust absolutely with his life on one hand. But even so, their preparation for the assignment has taught Derek to put at least some measure of faith in Stiles’ problem-solving abilities, if nothing else.

“Let’s just face the facts, Derek, you wouldn’t have broken any of the records without the aid of the best AI tactician around,” Stiles chuckled through the speaker of his helmet during simulation nine. “Consider me the Yoda of this partnership. Mentor you, I will.”

Derek doesn’t even bother to correct him, or to remind him of the fact that they’re only temporary partners until the mission is finished. He even manages a wry grin as the heavy beats of [_Joker and the Thief_](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ySjXFjLTagQ) send rhythmic vibrations through his armor plate. If anything, it sends his blood pumping and gives him a thrill the likes of which he hasn’t felt in a long time.

Or thought he would ever feel again.

Not that he’d ever plan on telling Stiles that.

 

 

Commander Argent dropped by Derek’s room after their tenth and final module, which he and Stiles had executed with near-perfect scores. He handed over a digital pad with the mission objectives and details carefully filed and planned out, with instructions to debrief himself over the course of the evening and attend a formal conference in the morning.

“You’d best get a good night’s rest, Hale,” he nodded, seeing himself out of the bunk with a nod, “You and your AI’s assigned mission starts right after the meeting.”

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's taken me so long to get a chapter out! Real Life is such a piece of work sometimes, ugh!
> 
> I've been listening to a lot of Daft Punk and Muse to get my blood pumping to write this. Maybe I'll make a playlist once it's done!

“This ‘mission’ of theirs seems awfully simple for someone of your capabilities,” Stiles mused out loud that evening.

Derek was poring over the mission report, the pages unclipped from the manila folder and spread out over the small table in his cabin. He had one of the overhead fluorescents on, casting the room in the yellowish, sickly-looking sterile atmosphere that Derek hated, yet endured day after day. Even so, Stiles’ soft luminescence lit the corner of his documents in his own special colour, bringing some relief to his weary vision. Hovering over his little chip, sitting apart from its ChipGuard, Stiles craned his neck and skimmed his eyes over the lettering, a completely redundant movement, as the same information had been downloaded into his drivers.

 “I don’t really care about it,” he grunted in reply, even though he really did. They _knew_ he was better than almost every Naut on the ARGUS, and the mission was laughably easy for someone who could literally break through solid concrete walls with his body and, in his half-shifted form, was faster than Usain Bolt, even loaded with his heavy armour. So yes, he was feeling less than pleased about it.

He would _not_ admit to the fact that Stiles’ belief in his capabilities made him feel warm and fuzzy inside. There was definitely no warming or fuzzying to be had.

“I don’t mean to stroke my Naut partner’s ego or anything,” Stiles continued, “but this is less of an operation and more of a milk-run for someone like you. Surely, they could have found someone else to do this.”

Derek shuffled some of the paperwork into order, trying not to feel flustered at the attention. “How far is the Zeta Base from here?”

“You’re looking at approximately six to six-point-three hours of travelling time,” the AI calculated promptly, the microprocessors on his body flickering a brighter colour as he processed the information. “Zeta Base is located on Asteroid L-405E, the largest in a series on the Calerian Belt, sector 8E. Records show that thick atmosphere and heavy barometric pressure, combined with the asteroid’s electromagnetic field, caused too much interference with the centre’s communications. ARGUS ordered the closing of the facility eight and a half years ago.” He noted Derek’s surprised raise of the brows and gave a replying, self-satisfied little smirk in return, obviously feeling incredibly proud of his abilities.

No, it definitely wasn’t cute, not at _all._

 

 

“I still think this assignment is too simple,” Stiles was _whining_ now, pacing the console of the small shuttle as Derek leaned back in his seat, trying desperately not to give in to the urge to yank the chip out of the keypad and fling it out of the ship window. At the speed at which they were flying, it would probably do more damage to his ship than anything, and someone like Stiles was irritatingly resilient. He’d find a way back.

“We have literally been in the ship for less than an hour, and you’re already complaining,” Derek shot back, massaging his temples with his fingertips. Weres never got anything as simple as the common cold, or headaches, but he was willing to bet that Stiles’ incessant moaning for the next five hours could bring one on. Hence the pre-emptive temple rubbing.

Stiles ceased his pacing and twisted around on his heel, pointing a finger squarely at the pilot. “I’m serious here, Derek. The directive is ludicrous. We land on Zeta Base, reach the crux processing unit at the centre of the station, retrieve some data from the technology core and come back. I mean – we’re _retrieving data_ like some sort of intergalactic courier service.” He returned to his marching to and fro, muttering under his breath. “Waste of potential, having you doing something so menial.”

“It’s not like there are any battles to fight at the moment,” Derek answered, shifting and trying to make himself comfortable in his Naut suit, scrunched up in the cockpit. “The Vu haven’t been causing any conflict in our sector for some time. You can only train so much before even menial tasks seem appealing. Besides,” he shifted again, trying not to wince as the hard edge of a pouch on his suit dug into his side, “at least you have something worthwhile to do. You’re the one piloting the ship, I’m the one stuck in the seat doing nothing for hours.”

“Like piloting this hunk of scrap metal is a difficult task for me,” Stiles scoffed, his holographic form exuding boredom. “The route is so easy to navigate, I could do it while in sleep mode and at severely depleted batteries, which is saying something, considering it takes a solid fortnight of operating at maximum capacity to deplete my energy source. Almost _all_ of the known sectors are pre-programmed into us to begin with. I’m just as bored as you are – we’re operating on such low processing power that we might as well be on autopilot.”

Conversation seemed to come to a standstill for all of three seconds before –

“Hey! We could play ‘I Spy-‘”

“No.”

“Why not? It’d be entertaining. Research has proven that even playing simple games keeps the brain stimulated and working at optimum –”

“I don’t want to play it because it’s a shitty game,” Derek answered. “There’s, what, exactly two things to guess? We’re in a ship and there’s the endless void of space stretching out around us.”

“Everything sounds sucky when you say it in that tone.”

“Maybe because it _is_ sucky,” he retorted childishly, missing the usual aggravation he’d be feeling if anybody else was annoying him. With Stiles, it felt more like a game, like banter between friends. But they _weren’t_ friends, they were temporary partners on an assignment. And technically Stiles wasn’t even _real_. But it was hard to remember that, when he acted so real, so… _human_.

“We could always talk,” The AI offered. “Get to know each other. Be all buddy-buddy. Have D&M’s.”

“D and whats-?”

“Deep and Meaningfuls. _Duh_.”

“I am _not_ having a ‘Deep and Meaningful’,” he made the air quotes with an air of disgust, “with you. It’s unprofessional. We’re not buddies. We’re not even partners.”

“Please. After this mission is over, you won’t want to be partnered with anybody else but me,” Stiles smirked with an air of superior all-knowingness. “Okay, how’s this sound? You tell me something about yourself, and I’ll tell you something about me.”

Derek snorted, unable to stop himself. “That’s stupid. You already know the important things about me from reading my file. And why would I be interested in-” He cut himself off abruptly, but Stiles was already narrowing his eyes, an offended, challenging look on his miniscule features. Derek suddenly felt supremely awkward, and then immediately annoyed with the fact he was feeling awkward for putting his foot in it about an _artificial intelligence_. They didn’t have real emotions, or memories. Why did he care?

“I live in Northern California back on Earth,” he found himself saying. “My family and I all lived in a huge house in Beacon Hills before I moved out into an apartment on my own. It’s this pokey little town, and there were so many of us living together that using the bathrooms in the morning was hell.”

“Wow,” Stiles laughed, the serious expression on his face vanishing immediately. “I knew your family was large, but I wouldn’t have guessed that big strong Lycan Naut Derek Hale once had to fight for the bathroom.”

“Your turn,” he growled, surprised that he wasn’t bothered by the ribbing. Maybe because unlike others, Stiles wasn’t doing it out of malice, or speciesism.

“My programmed age is twenty years old,” Stiles grinned, arms spread out and moving in a slow pirouette, as if on a catwalk. “Sometimes I wish they’d given me a better physique, y’know? Some of those AIs out there, wow,” he whistled, a sound Derek honestly didn’t know AIs could make – it sounded way too casual, too human. “They’ve obviously had some more time spent on their holographic projections than I have. And the guys? Hunk-a hunk-a burning pecs, if you know what I mean. And meanwhile, I just end up looking scrawny. At least I have a nice personality, right?”

Derek folded his hands together in his lap and very discreetly dug his thumbnail into the soft part of his suit’s glove over the palm. The pain grounded him enough to refrain from pointing out that he thought Stiles was better-looking than any other AI he’d either seen or worked with. He figured that if anyone was told that their shoulder-to waist ration was perfect and their upturned nose was adorable, they’d file a harassment suit against him. He already had Laura remind him of every stupid thing he’d done in the past on a regular basis, he didn’t need his stupidity recorded for posterity.

“Laura tells people that I almost failed the written test when I tried out for ARGUS, and the only reason they let me through was because of my Lycan strength.”

“That’s something I already knew,” Stiles nodded, tapping two fingers to his temple. “Your file is stored at the forefront of my cortex. It’s strange that people don’t regard you as intelligent – your score was one of the higher ones during the exam.”

“People think that you can have either brawn or brain, but not both.”

“Definitely not the case with you, then, you’re the whole package,” Stiles murmured, folding his arms and giving Derek an appreciative once-over. Derek often got those looks from others, but he never really felt self-conscious, not when the looks he got never went any further than his epidermis.

After the first few romantic hiccups earlier on in his life, he got pretty used to being treated like a piece of man-meat to be ogled at, lusted after. He didn’t care, not really, especially when he wasn’t interested in anything anybody had to offer. But the strangely earnest way that Stiles was looking at him, with that head full of his information, his history, looking not just at him but _through_ him, seeing multiple facets of him – somehow, that felt more personal and intimate than anybody had looked at him in a long time. The tips of his ears felt strangely hot, and he swallowed the lump that had somehow formed in his throat.

“My turn, right?” Stiles chuckled, unaffected, like his genuine expression hadn't just sent Derek into a spiral of self-awareness. “Alright. Let’s see – When they programmed me, they used more advanced algorithms than most of the Military AIs. I was supposed to be a prototype for a more intelligent design – you know, have faster access to information ports, be able to bypass firewalls and eradicate viruses. I turned out to be a pretty good partner for my last Naut, so I don’t really get to use my capabilities as often as I thought I would.”

“Explains how easily you got my file,” Derek noted.

“Yeah, it was a cinch. Not even sorry.” the AI cackled.

“I should probably be worried about your lack of morals, but honestly, I couldn’t care less.”

“Okay, gimme something else. Something juicy, this time.”

They went back and forth for a while. Derek’s facts were simple things, nothing too private, until all of a sudden they were, telling Stiles memories of his school days, his family vacations and how annoying Laura was, but how he couldn’t imagine enlisting without her. Stiles’ facts were mostly about his matrix makeup, his experiences in the lab, and it was pretty interesting, even to someone who wasn’t versed in in technology, but Derek wanted to know more.

“What happened to your previous Naut?” Derek asked, just after he’d told Stiles about the fishing trip with his family, where Cora had thrown his box of tackle off the side of the boat because the fish he’d caught had been bigger than hers. It was an insensitive question to ask, and he should feel guilty for asking, for sticking his foot in his mouth. Everybody in ARGUS, even someone as obtuse as he, knew that AIs always had one partner for the length of their service. Seven years, that was the length of their partnership before both Naut and AI retired. There was only one explanation for why an AI was still in service and available for a partnership long after coming off the assembly line – their Naut had perished in the line of duty.

It was an incredibly invasive question, one that Derek would have expected Stiles to shrug off, or refuse to answer completely. In the past, Stiles had mentioned a ‘Scott’, another Lycan who had been his Naut, but the mentions had always been offhand, as if he’d spoken his name without thinking, without meaning to. He’d never elaborated before, or gone into detail, and Derek guessed that it was because it was a subject too painful to bring up. And judging by the way Stiles’ easy-going grin slid off his face, he could tell he’d probed too far.

“I’m sorry,” he said, feeling like a jerk. “I shouldn’t have asked. I –”

“No, it’s – it’s okay,” Stiles replied, and his smile was back, even though it wasn’t as bright as before. “I don’t talk about Scott because I miss the guy. He was – he was pretty good to work with, y’know? Nauts and their AIs usually become pretty good friends when they work together for a while, but Scott and I? We were besties. We were bros.”

“So what happened?” Derek ventured, his curiosity getting the better of him. “Did he-?”

“Oh. Oh, no, he didn’t _die_ or anything,” Stiles amended quickly, waving his hands for emphasis. “No, we – he’s still good. He’s fine. We had a good service together, and then he retired from ARGUS with full honours. He’s probably back home on Earth, popping out kids by the basketful with his pretty wife.”

“You always just seem sad when you mention him.”

“Well – yeah. I mean, it’s normal to miss your best friend when you haven’t spoken in ages, isn’t it? He was the closest thing I had to a family member, since, you know, manufactured in a lab and all.” He sighed, folding his arms and looking out the cabin windows into the vast expanse of space stretched out before them. “Military AIs never get much of a chance to see things outside of their functions or missions. He was always talking about how we’d go on vacations to the Grand Canyon, Niagara Falls, Mount Rushmore, all sorts of cheesy touristy things. But he didn’t take a vacation during his service, not once, and then,” he shrugged one shoulder, an unemotional gesture, “he finished. And then he left, and I haven’t spoken to him since.”

Derek didn’t know what to say to that. He couldn’t ever remember having someone so close that he’d been able to confide in, at least someone not related to him. Despite being a manufactured entity, Stiles was more human than most people he worked with. He was sarcastic, funny, and intelligent beyond measure. Not to mention, after working with him for so long, loyal without a doubt. He honestly couldn’t fathom how someone could spend _years_ being partnered with an AI like Stiles, and then cut off all communications with him.

“That sucks,” he said succinctly, because, well it did. What else was he supposed to say?

“It happens. I mean, I thought I got saddled with a pretty sour guy, but you’re not actually that bad, not once you get past that antisocial façade you’ve put up for no good reason.”

“I have a reason,” Derek spoke quickly, “I just don’t like people.”

“Good thing I’m not people then,” Stiles smirked.

“We’re not even proper partners,” Derek groaned, trying to sound _reasonable_ , of all things, and failing. “What makes you sure that I’ll want to keep you around after this mission is over?”

“Don’t tell anybody, but you’re not as scary and mean as you make yourself out to be. And I could be wrong, but I’m pretty sure that you’ve taken a shine to my sparkling personality and rapier-like wit.”

“Whatever,” he replied, but his mouth was curled in a fond smile. Perhaps Stiles was right – he was an annoying little brat of a thing, but he definitely made Derek’s life more interesting, that was for sure. The realisation made his chest feel constricted and warm, to know that he’d earned a friendship with another person without catches. He was very pointedly not thinking about the fact that Stiles wasn’t even human – a friend was a friend, and that was that.

“Back in Beacon Hills, our house – the big one that my family live in – sits on acres and acres of forest. There’s this lake where my sisters and cousins and I all used to swim in during the summer.” He smiled, remembering Laura’s laughing face as she’d tossed Cora into the crystalline water of the mere. “There’s this little grotto near the rock facings on one side, behind this little waterfall. The water inside is always cold, and there’s a hole in the rock wall that lets the light in when the sun hits it at a certain angle. It makes the inside water of the grotto all these crazy colours, almost neon, all sparkly and glittery.”

“Wow. That sounds – really amazing,” Stiles effused.

“It is,” he agreed. “All of us kids carved our initials into the rock face. I cut myself with the knife when I did mine, because I wanted the ‘D’ to have rounder edges. It healed before anybody saw, which is great, because otherwise my mom would have held it over my head forever.” He tapped his fingertips against the console, twice in quick succession while he made his mind up. It couldn’t hurt, not really. “I was thinking of maybe taking a holiday sometime. Want to come along?”

The tiny, holographic form that made up Stiles froze, his mouth flapping open and closed like a fish. It was almost laughable, how very humanly awkward he acted. “Yeah! Definitely!” he squeaked, practically vibrating with energy. “Are you really saying you’re gonna take me to Earth?”

“I wouldn’t mention it if I wasn’t serious about it,” he grumbled back. When was the last time he’d brought anybody back to the house? When was the last time he’d gone back to see his family? Not for a while, at least.

“Great!” Stiles beamed, looking so delighted that any hesitation that he’d carried before at the idea of letting someone into his life seemed to disappear completely. “I’ll definitely hold you to that.”

And that was that.

 

 

The ARGUS Zeta Base on Asteroid L-405E was, in all honesty, a rundown scrap heap. Abandoned for so long and combined with the asteroid’s difficult climate and low-oxygen pressure meant that it looked less like an information base and more like a large, rusted shack amongst the dirt. Their small ship landed with minimal fuss inside the carriers, almost soundlessly. Double-checking his oxygen reserves and the closures of the suit, he pulled Stiles’ microprocessor from the ChipGuard (Stiles’ holographic figure flickered off) and slid it into the slot on the chest of his suit, specially made for the Naut’s AI companion’s chip. The cover slid over it with a resounding click, and, after inventory was complete, he lifted the hatch door and slid out.

“Naut D. Hale, commencing ARGUS Assignment 4382,” he spoke, unclipping his service weapon from the ship’s interior and hefting it into his armoured gloves, the door of the craft sliding shut.

“Roger that,” Stiles spoke back from the inside of his suit.

“All parameters of the Naut suit are fully functional and ready for use. Oxygen tank at ninety-nine point nine percent capacity.”

Against the electronic diode screen in front of his eyes, Stiles’ name flashed in the corner, coloured blue for activated.

“Layout of the station is simple enough,” Stiles continued, while Derek squared his shoulders inside the armour, the stiff, Kevlar-based protective covering moulded like a second skin on his body. “Like most ARGUS bases, it’s arranged on a grid system, with the central information core located in the heart of the base. Mission control has ordered us to find the out-dated information hub located in the facility, which contains ARGUS data which includes classified information relevant to the organisation. If unable to retrieve, the objective changes to destroying the hub, to avoid it falling into enemy hands.”

“And I just plug you into the server to retrieve the info?” Derek asked, adjusting his helmet a touch, before finally starting forward.

“A-yep,” Stiles’ professional manner dropped like a hot potato. “Just think of me as your personal, though much handsomer by far, USB stick. There’ll be a slot beside the hub where you can insert my chip. And, if not, we can rig up some of the original cables and plug them into a dock so I can connect to the mainframe and access it from there.”

“AI battery check,” he requested, weird because he’d never checked up on any of his previous AI partners before. Maybe it was because, despite acting like a little shit sometimes, he’d finally warmed up enough to an AI to have a proper working relationship with them, and consider keeping them as a long-time partner. He was more than confident that Stiles had his back, that much had become certain after their training modules, but now – well, he felt he could even _trust_ Stiles with the decisions he made. Perhaps, soon enough, even with his life.

“Battery at one-hundred percent. Estimated battery life three hundred and thirty-eight hours. Let’s get this show on the road!”

The carriers were located at the far south end of the base in a separate carrier, a cross-shaped structure, and connected by a narrow metal walkway. Derek strode purposefully down the passageway, cast in pitch black save for the halogen torchlight that lit automatically, located atop of the helmet. Stiles probably had something to do with that – aside from basic motor functions, Nauts couldn’t activate functions on their suits without inputting the command vocally. It was pretty handy to have an AI who knew how to function a suit without asking.

Derek had been in plenty of these facilities before. Never on this particular asteroid, but aside from the gravity being slightly heavier than usual (something he hardly even noticed with his Lycan strength and ability to acclimatize), the layout was almost the same. The doorways were slightly more difficult to work with. The entries were rusty with disuse and difficult to move. The first door opened easily enough when Derek typed the access code into the keypad, but the inner doors were more problematic. Stiles solved the problem easily, as Derek pulled his chip from his suit and opened the control panel on the side of the entry, plugging the microprocessor directly via the cables.

“Oy vey, these cords are _old_ ,” Stiles muttered, as the sound of keys clacking echoed dimly in the background of his helmet. The AI must have known what he was doing, because it took hardly more than thirty seconds to disengage the locks on the doors.

“How many combinations did you go through?” he asked, feeling more than a little impressed.

“Well, the ARGUS door codes run on a numerical keypad with ten separate numbers, zero through nine,” Stiles explained, as Derek unplugged the cords and slipped the chip back into his suit. “The passcodes are seven digits long, with the possibility of number repetition, however the orders of the numbers must be correct for the passcode to work. Inputting the variables of different numbers, numbers used, the order and the repetition, the permutations available-”

“English, for the love of god,” Derek groaned, feeling his head swim.

“- about ten million possible combinations.” Stiles finished, and Derek could just _tell_ by his tone that he was smug about it. Which, to be fair, was something worthy of being smug for, considering he’d processed and keyboarded _ten million_ possibilities in less than half a minute.

According to Stiles’ data, Zeta Base was fairly small compared to others, but still an impressive four miles long, from one end of the base to the other. Combined with the obstacles of the doors, the general darkness of the place and the familiar-yet-not-quite-the-same layout, Derek estimated three to four hours from start to finish of the assignment. Even so, with a simple objective in sight, Derek’s hackles were raised, aware of his surroundings. Being in the military so many years had taught him that no mission, however straightforward and easy it might seem, remained so.

The map of Zeta Base, wired in Stiles’ system, glowed in the far-right corner of the halogen display inside his helmet. Stiles had, of course, mapped out the easiest, most direct route to the central core. Stiles had been right – this recon was far too simple for someone of his talents, for a partnership like theirs. Regardless, Derek was looking forward to finishing their task and heading back to the mother ship. All the talk they’d had during their flight had made Derek feel homesick, something he hadn’t felt in a long time. Perhaps he could take his vacation sooner, rather than later.

Realistically speaking, the fastest route between two points was a straight line, and though the base was built on a concentric circle, there were enough doorways to allow for a semi-direct route. The design of the base overall seemed, to him, like a concentric maze, the radial lines interspersed here and there forming the different rooms of the facility.

“Something doesn’t seem right,” Stiles murmured at their third door, around ten minutes later. Derek couldn’t hear anything out of the ordinary, but then again, his Lycan hearing was impaired – not only by the thickness of his helmet, but by the thick gravity and atmosphere of the asteroid, now that the base wasn’t properly operational and the normalized gravity field coefficients weren’t activated. It had the similar effect of having cotton balls wadded up in his ears.

“Doesn’t seem right how?” he asked, avidly watching the keypad lighting up as Stiles processed the numbers from his chip.

“It’s weird.” the AI mumbled back. “I mean, I can access the codes just as easily as before, but I’m getting the feel that this keypad has been used before.”

“Well, obviously it has. It _was_ a research facility manned by nearly five hundred personnel.”

“I mean,” Stiles returned with an aggravated sigh as the new passcode was accepted, the doors sliding open, “the keypad has been used _recently_.”

The hair on the back of Derek’s neck stood up, and he tightened his grip on the pistol as he stepped through. “How recently are we talking?”

“Difficult to say, since it doesn’t leave much of a trace. But no longer than a week.” His voice was serious, which made Derek feel even more worried. “There’s a data port about five feet down the corridor. Hook me into that so I can do a proper sweep of the place.”

“You’re going to _scan_ an entire base?” Derek gawped. “That’s ridiculous! It’ll take forever.”

“With a regular Military AI, it would,” Stiles countered. “But don’t forget, I’m a special snowflake.” Derek ejected the microchip from his suit again and twisted the metal handle of the data port door open. Rusted, it fell apart between his fingers.

“Slide open the protective cover off the base to expose the processors and slide my chip flat against that smooth part there,” Stiles’ voice instructed, and Derek did as he was told. When stabilised onto the flat surface, Stiles’ holographic form appeared again, casting the tiny box in a suffused, blue-tinged glow. “Now just give me a few minutes to run a quick probe of the station. Shouldn’t take very long.”

“How big is your search?” Derek asked, because he’d heard of Military AIs having the capability of running room scans, but not on an entire base. And he didn’t know how AIs operated, but maybe he was just a little worried that this would prove too much for Stiles, maybe short-circuit him or something.

“Derek, it’s fine.” Stiles’ hands extended out in front of him, fingers waving as if stretching them for something complex. “Nothing I can’t handle.”

“How big?” he pressed, eyebrows furrowed.

“Derek-”

“Command authorisation code 5, manual override. Stiles, _what is the area of your search_. Define battery usage in search.”

Stiles’ tiny, see-through body froze, and the dark-blue accents on his skin flared with vertically-moving white synapses as the directive overrode his regular programming. The code, CAC5, was a sort of truth-serum for AIs, a failsafe system implemented in their core matrix to bypass whatever programmed ‘personality’ they had and give them the facts straight. It was rarely used, and Derek honestly felt like a bit of a jerk – he knew that he’d hate it if someone forced him to spill the beans.

“With the inclusion of ship carriers, mess hall and extraneous buildings, radius of search block is 2.1 miles, extending in a search area of 13.85 square miles, or 386,242,209.23 square feet. Processing time approximately 6.4 minutes, battery usage estimated 4 percent.” Stiles rattled the information off, eyes looking glazed and voice monotone. It was so unlike Stiles that Derek felt a little ill just watching.

But then Stiles finished, and his shoulders relaxed, though there was a pinched expression on his face, and his eyes narrowed.

“Dude, that was a dick move.”

“Yeah. Sorry.” Derek replied, because he genuinely was. It wasn’t something he wanted to see again, definitely not from Stiles.

“Don’t do it again. That fucking sucks.”

“Noted.”

“Now, can I _please_ conduct my search, since it’ll only take a few minutes and leave me with plenty of battery left?”

“Go ahead.”

The AI huffed out an aggravated breath, held his arms out, and began the scan. Derek couldn’t tell exactly what was happening, but he watched closely in rapt fascination as Stiles held himself completely immobile, fingers splayed open with palms facing downwards. The microunits on his skin glowed brightly again, darts of light flickering up and down his form as the information passed through his tiny body, faster than any human could possibly hope to process.

It was a little disconcerting to see Stiles doing what he was programmed to do, as a Military AI Unit. With surprise, Derek found himself remembering that Stiles was _not_ an actual human, but a man-made organism, with a personality and consciousness, yes, but man-made all the same.

Not for the first time, Derek felt acute disappointment.

Stiles continued his search, an expression of concentration etched into his features. He hardly moved, save for the slight twitch of his long, dextrous fingers hovering in the air. Derek noted, once or twice, that Stiles’ hologram display seemed to flicker, but he didn’t think anything of it. It was, after all, an intense search. Surely a purely cosmetic function of the AI, their ‘body’, mustn’t be given as high importance when the priority was obtaining the results.

After what felt like eons (but was, in all probability, exactly 6.4 minutes from Stiles’ calculations) the tiny AI lowered his arms, his body relaxing from its still position. He blinked up at Derek, an inscrutable expression written across his face.

“Holy shit. Quickly! Slide me back into your suit and return the data port to as close condition as you found it in before.” He clasped his hands together, looking harried that he couldn’t contribute, since his form was immaterial. “Derek, I think we might be in trouble.”

“What do you mean?” he asked, throat constricting as he hurried to comply with Stiles’ orders, picking up the broken handle of the port and closing the hatch door. Stiles’ chip slid into his suit, and his name lit up the inside right corner in blue.

“I mean,” Stiles murmured in his ear from inside the suit, voice low, “That the scan came back with a large number of life forms in the immediate area. Derek – we’re surrounded by Vu.” 


	4. Chapter 4

Derek felt the bottom of his stomach drop somewhere around the steel-capped toes of his armoured boots.

“What do you mean, Vu?” he asked, hoping against all hopes that he’d misheard.

“I mean,” Stiles spoke, voice still heavy with caution, “That there’s a bunch of Vu in this facility. Scratch that, not a bunch – it’s _teeming_ with them. At least forty. That’s why the doorway keypads were recently used – they must have used a keypad scrambler to access the codes.”

“What the hell are they doing here?” Derek hissed, tucking his body to one side of the wall, partially obscured by an alcove. “The asteroid should be located on neutral grounds.”

“How the hell should I know?” Stiles hissed back. “All I know is that this stupidly simple recon mission is has unexpectedly turned more dangerous than either of us could have imagined.”

“Can we radio back to base? They’ll need to know about this.”

“Give me a sec,” Stiles spoke, lapsing into silence as he attempted to get in touch with ARGUS. Another few minutes passed in tense silence, until-

“I can’t,” the voice from his helmet moaned, frustrated. “The thick atmosphere on the asteroid should only have been a minor problem, but the Vu must have activated an electromagnetic communications blocker. Data lines between us and base camp are completely shot.”

“So we’re stuck in the base on our own, with no means of contacting the ship? Perfect.” Derek scoffed, hating everything a lot more than usual. “If the Vu are using comms-blockers, they’re probably doing something that’s gonna result in a lot of bullet casings and a whole lot of trouble for the higher-ups at ARGUS.”

“What should we do? We’re still on the outskirts of the Base, we’ve only gone through a few doors so far. Nothing that’s tripped any alarms they could have planted.” Stiles hummed, thinking. “Technically we could turn around hightail it out of here without anyone being the wiser. Get back to the ship and let them know about it. But that would mean abandoning the mission.”

“Which we can’t do. The hub we’re supposed to retrieve could have sensitive information that could be harmful in the wrong hands. If the Vu have been stationed here a week, they’re probably planning another siege of a nearby extraction mine.” The alien race mostly dwelled on the outskirts of their quadrant, hardly making contact – the times they did were never pleasant, poaching and ransacking ships and cargo holds, extraction mines for power and resources.

“That’s true. Even if the information isn’t restricted, they could exploit even the simplest things, like localities of ARGUS consignments.”

“What do you think we should do?” Derek asked, something he’d never found himself querying before. He took orders from Laura, his Alpha, without question, and Peter (if push came to shove), but on solo missions such as this, he relied on himself and what his gut instinct told him. He’d never asked his temporary AI partner for their opinion on the matter at hand. “Should we turn back? Or keep going?”

Stiles went quiet in the close confines of the helmet, so much so that Derek had to flick his eyes over the inner display of his hood’s screen to double-check that Stiles’ blue icon was marked as active.

“There’s something you must remember about AIs, Derek.” Stiles spoke. “We’re programmed, above all else, to ensure the successful completion of the missions we’ve been assigned.” He paused, making Derek hold his breath for him to go on. “AIs weren’t created to be autonomous. Humans, Lycan, Vu, alien subspecies – they’re all self-governing, independent beings, independent and subject to its own laws only. We don’t function that way. _I_ can’t function that way. I exist and function as a dependant organism, restrained by my base coding.”

“In other words, we _have_ to complete this mission,” Derek returned.

“It isn’t nearly as unconditional as that, Derek,” Stiles answered back. "After all, I have no physical body of my own to move around with. AIs are completely dependent on their Nauts for manoeuvrability. Sure, I might be instinctually obligated to finish this mission, but ultimately the choice is up to you, since you're the one with a working pair of legs. If you want to continue the mission, we can. But there's one catch."

"Which is?"

"The mission objective would be my sole focus. Do you understand what that means?"

"You're going to be streamlining your focus on the retrieval of the information hub, is that right?"

"Right in one," Stiles sighed, sounding almost apologetic. "I will, of course, be using my abilities to their full potential to avoid outright conflict with the enemy, and planning the best strategies to get to our final objective. But Derek, you have to realise that some of my decisions, and I won't be able to tell you which ones or when, but some will definitely be in the best interests of ARGUS." He paused a moment, as if trying to figure the best wording. "It means that you'll have to think on your feet, too, and keep your Lycan senses honed sharp."

"Why is that?" Derek asked, genuinely curious. Before, Stiles had always insisted that Derek could trust his decisions, lean on him for guidance in sticky situations during their simulations.

"Because," Stiles murmured, "The parameters of my coding mean that the success of the mission is valued and prioritised above all else. Including-" he trailed off, voice fluctuating with something Derek couldn't quite parse.

"-including the safety of my own Naut partner."

 

 

The layout of the station was simple enough, once Stiles had the map route expanded to fill almost the entire left side of Derek’s helmet visor, rather than the small corner on his right. Their plan was simple enough to follow through without containing too many variables to allow errors, and strategic enough for it to work. Stiles and Derek had collaborated on it together, and it was harebrained enough to work.

Derek would traverse through the majority of the base through the service ducts, air vents and maintenance chutes. Many of them were a tight squeeze for someone of Derek’s musculature, but his dogged determination was more than enough to push both of them through. Stiles created a quick algorithm that would predict with slightly above-average accuracy the movement of the Vu around the base, determined on prior information gathered on the alien species concerning their patrol patterns. They took, of course, extra precautions. Stiles kept the lighting he cast from the helmet at a low glow, shutting it off completely if they were to move past flues that could filter the light outwards and attract attention (which, now that he had the entire base structure blueprints downloaded into his databank, he could predict the sphere of the torch’s halo within millimetres to the openings). Stiles also muted the openings of the suit as much as possible so that, were Derek to speak to him, his voice wouldn’t be heard as much outside the suit. The external microphone was switched off altogether, and though the suit felt slightly more restrictive than before, it was a necessary precaution. Derek would prefer the too-close feeling of claustrophobia than chance his voice echoing, however slightly, through the metal passageways and alerting a stray Vu.

It was slow moving, now that they had targets to avoid and alternate routes to take. A course that would have, at a slow pace, taken them an hour or two to navigate to the core, had been extended to a crawling pace of six to eight hours to reach the centre. And that was without counting the possible altercations they were desperately trying to avoid.

The hour was absolute hell. Stiles led Derek quietly through a topmost air vent, which ran the perimeter of the second outermost ring of the base. Derek was reduced to an army crawl, shifting his body in excruciatingly slow increments, his gun strapped to the back of the suit and trying to keep as quiet as possible in a space that hardly allowed any movement. They were both keenly aware of the possible enemies roaming the hallways and corridors, and he was profoundly appreciative that Stiles had effectively silenced any noise coming from his helmet, because his exhales from the exertion on his arms were deafening to his ears.

“You’re heating up a little,” Stiles observed quietly, despite Derek knowing full well that the AI couldn’t be heard from outside the armour of his headgear. Still, the voice murmuring directly in his ears was a strangely welcome companionship, unobtrusively low as if Stiles were sharing his discomfort.

“It’s getting a little tough keeping this pace,” Derek huffed in reply, his breathing starting to come a little ragged.

“I’m surprised you’ve gone so long without a break,” his electronic partner commented. “Take a breather for a few minutes while I plan our next course of action. Catch your breath and then we’ll sort out our next move.”

“Alright,” Derek responded, sinking slowly to his stomach and crossing his arms underneath his head, complacent to Stiles’ suggestion because, well, it was the smart thing to do. If he ran himself ragged now, just out of stubbornness, their chances of making it out of any possible immediate conflict would be minimal. His helmet suddenly felt a little less heated, a small gust of cool air blowing across his sweaty face.

“What are you doing?” he hissed, perplexed and surprised into grouchiness at the sudden change.

“Relax, I’m just cooling you down a little bit. Your breath’s creating condensation on the inside of your helmet. I’m just getting rid of the moisture so you can see better.”

“Whatever,” Derek grumped, closing his eyes against the bright colours of the halogen display in front of his face and breathing deeply, welcoming the chance for a short break. His Lycan ability to process his metabolism and recovery rate was second to none compared to regular human Nauts, but regardless, he was glad for the few minutes of rest. As the burning in his biceps, hamstrings and quadriceps lessened, his brain was running a million miles a minute, the enormity of the situation finally dawning on him now that he had a few moments to spare.

He hadn’t said goodbye to Laura. Or to Peter, or his parents, or the other members of his family. Of course, every operative of ARGUS had a will written up in case of emergencies on the field, but he couldn’t even bring himself to imagine Laura’s face if something should go wrong, what expression she might make when Commander Argent broke the news, handed over the sealed paper packet bequeathing all his earthly possessions to be divided between his remaining family members.

There were so many thing he still hadn’t done, a life he hadn’t properly experienced outside of the military, a future to be mourned, unlived. Every mission carried, with it, the danger of not returning, but this assignment had been deemed nothing dangerous, and he hadn’t given his usual, proper goodbyes to his sister, his Alpha. And if something were to happen – well, there would be more than a little regret.

And Stiles – he couldn’t let the Vu get their hands on him. It didn’t matter that the AI was a manufactured microchip of wires and circuits, of sequencers and processes made to appear and act human. More than any other AI partner he’d had before, Stiles was a spark of laughter and sarcasm, in possession of unique _humanity_ that couldn’t possibly be replicated. He’d heard of what happened when the Vu scavengers got hold of ARGUS equipment. They pulled them apart to dissect how things operated, leeching off ARGUS concepts and cobbling together assorted technologies to end up with some sort of Frankenstein-esque machinery they could use for their own purposes.

AIs didn’t stand a chance with Vu. Their chips were too small and smooth, too complex, to be handled by the clumsy appendages of the extra-terrestrials. He’d seen Vu handle AI chips while on a stakeout. Frustrated with the inability to pry information from them (the AIs programmed to be unconditionally loyal to ARGUS), the Vu had simply torn them apart, trampled them under their feet until they cracked into splinters, smashed them between stones like a rudimentary mortar and pestle, a game as the tinny voices of the AIs shrieked and sputtered into nothingness.

“Derek?” Stiles’ voice, uncharacteristically soft, broke him out of his reverie. “How you holdin’ up?”

“I think I’m good,” Derek replied, flexing his fingers in the stiff, armoured gloves. The lactic acid in his strained muscles had subsided, the burn of his rigorous exercise metabolised into normalcy. “What’s the plan?”

“There’s a drop-down chute in another hundred and twenty yards down this way. It’s pretty much a straight line, but then we’re gonna have to open the vent and drop into a store room to access a door. I’ll need you to plug me into another port to jimmy the lock, and then we can enter another service tunnel and sneak a little further that way.”

“Got it,” he responded, folding his fingers into fists and resuming his crawl. He gritted his teeth, wriggling his body onwards while making as little noise as possible. No, now wasn’t the time to regret his choice to continue the mission. He would get through it with Stiles leading the way, and return to ARGUS to see Laura and Peter, and return to Earth to see his family. He wouldn’t let the Vu get him, wouldn’t let them get their hands on Stiles’ chip. And maybe he would finally take that vacation he’d been putting off for no good reason, see if Stiles was interested in seeing the mountainous terrain of their town, the sharp scent of pine over the valleys and the rocky caves where he’d had campouts with his siblings as a child.

He’d get Stiles back home, come hell or high water.

 

 

As straightforward as the first part of their travelling had been, Derek was forced to keep reminding himself that, as fine as it seemed to be, it wouldn’t remain so for long. Akin to wandering deeper into the lion’s den, the danger increased the deeper they stalked into the station.

Their first conflict came as Derek dropped into the empty storage room at the end of the vent. Using the information collected thus far from Derek’s headway down the tunnels, Stiles had created an itinerary of their course, with planned resting points to keep up Derek’s energy and progress without straining his endurance. After the short break, the plan was to drop into the empty room, jimmy open the door and cross through two more rings of hallways, where they would then infiltrate a service corridor and make their way through that.

What they _hadn't_ expected was the solitary Vu guard standing patrol in the room.

Stiles, of course, gave him plenty of warning beforehand, but it was still an unpleasant occurrence that he _really_ wished he didn’t have to deal with. With the front light on his helmet switched off, Derek could only just make out the form of the alien creature in the room below through the horizontal slots of the exhaust. The Vu had a small torch settled on the ground amongst the detritus of the room, throwing eerie, sickly green light around the room. The Vu was sitting on a discarded packing crate, doing something that resembled whittling with a rusted piece of iron fashioned into a crude knife. It was facing the doorway, obviously put on a patrol of some sort, but hardly paying attention when consigned to a closed-off room in a previously-abandoned military base. Derek’s vent was, fortunately, located behind the Vu, which would make a stealth attack a hell of a lot easier.

Despite having first-hand encounters with the race, and undergoing plenty of simulators, Derek could never feel used to seeing the sickly shape of the aliens. Scientifically named _‘Do’Tye Kaivu’_ in their original tongue (and shortened for obvious reasons), the Vu shared several (disturbingly) similar characteristics to Earth cockroaches, complete with slick-shiny exoskeletons that clacked as they walked on their bipedal, segmented legs. Cockroaches were a fitting description to a race that made its living as foragers and scavengers of their system, and the parallel was further enforced by the guttural, clicking speech, and the insect-like features of their face. Like many of the other Vu, its body armour was comprised of assorted flotsam and jetsam cobbled together, debris stolen from their raids.

Unscrewing the bolts from the air vent was simple enough work, but made marginally more difficult by the necessity to keep silent. Stiles murmured softly in Derek’s ear throughout the process as the screwdriver from his belt tool kit slowly worked on the aged rivets, words of encouragement that bolstered Derek’s confidence, letting him recall the countless simulated conflicts and hand-to-hand combat experience. Gingerly lifting the grate off and settling it aside, Derek waited a moment to collect his thoughts, before gripping the side of the opening and gently, oh so gently, easing himself through. The ceiling wasn’t particularly high, and, arms extended and body elongated from hanging down, the drop from his feet to the floor was only about four or five feet.

“Four point three,” Stiles whispered, and Derek dropped down into a crouch, years of military experience and Lycan senses making him soundless. His body moving on trained tactical autopilot, he darted forward and efficiently clamped his forearms around the alien’s head. Before the enemy could retaliate, or even so much as react, Derek snapped his neck with a practiced, vicious twist, the only sound made in the few moments of conflict the sickening crunch of the creature’s exoskeleton splintering at the break point, its inner vertebrae snapped. It crumpled to the ground in a twitching, juddering heap, barely avoiding knocking the torch askew. In a matter of moments, Derek had ruthlessly killed another creature, but both he and Stiles knew better than to leave any chance of being discovered through acts of misplaced softheartedness.

“Well – that was exciting,” Stiles remarked humourlessly, while Derek hefted the Vu from under its arms and dragged the body over to the corner, hiding it under scraps of discarded aluminium sheeting. There was a moment of silence while Derek went over his armour, checking everything before, “Derek, you okay?”

“Fine.” he answered automatically, tightening one of the straps on his thigh guard.

“Yeah, I bet that line would work on someone who, you know, wasn’t hooked up to your vitals and could smell your bullshit from a mile off by your pulse. Pull me out.”

“Stiles, we don’t have-”

“Pull. Me. _Out_.” Stiles demanded, and with a resigned sigh, Derek complied, unlatching the cover on the microchip’s slot and pulling Stiles’ processor out. Laying it in the flat of his hand, Stiles’ miniature holographic form flickered into existence, a bright spot of blue in the dimness of the room. His arms were crossed, and the expression on his diminutive face seemed to war between concern and solemnity.

“You’re anxious,” the AI stated, and Derek almost regretted working with him long enough to understand his offhand remark.

“I wasn’t expecting conflict so soon,” he nodded towards the pile of scrap metal, where a body was now hidden. He shook his head, desperately disgusted with himself for showing weakness so early on, for showing any reaction than the automated military levelheadedness he’d been trained to have. “I wasn’t expecting any of this.”

The little, blue figure glowing in his palm heaved a sigh. “Derek – buddy, lift me up some more. Get me eye-level with you.” Derek did so, noting that this was the first time he’d had Stiles at such close proximity. Usually, whenever Stiles’ hologram was activated, Derek kept him at mid-chest level. At this closeness, he could make out small beauty marks scattered across the AI’s body, moles that were probably added to give the figure a more flawed, human-like imperfection. Somehow, Derek found these blemishes to be anything but flawless.

Stiles levelled him with an expression on his face of such earnestness that he was stunned into silence. “It’s okay, Derek.” he expressed, all jest completely abandoned. “You’re not the first person to feel fear and apprehension during a mission, and you won’t be the last. I know Scott-” his words stumble to a halt, as if he had a human sort of throat that could constrict with emotion, before he continued with determination in his voice, “Scott almost shat his khakis whenever Finstock ordered him on more modules, and the first time we went on a mission together, he locked himself in the bathroom and spent four hours crying and vomiting. He passed out and woke up hugging the toilet.”

“Is this supposed to make me feel any better?” he asked, even as he felt his lips curling beneath his helmet.

“Probably not. But Derek, the point is you’re human. It’s a natural response to feel anxiety in high-stress situations.” He reached out with a tiny, incorporeal hand, and then stopped himself abruptly, a pained expression twisting his usually bright countenance. Derek, for the most part, felt immense relief that the AI wasn’t plugged into his suit at that moment, couldn’t hear the stuttering of his pulse as he thought, for the briefest moment, that Stiles was reaching out to touch him.

“Just stick with me, dude, and you won’t go wrong.” Stiles grinned, somehow managing to look overly-cheerful enough to almost be convincing. “We’ll make it out of here in one piece, and then we can tell Control to go fuck themselves and research their assignments better.”

Derek found himself agreeing vehemently.

 

 

They managed to take down two more Vu quietly and discreetly, while keeping Derek’s location a secret. One of them was a close call – it’d been patrolling the corridor, and Derek hadn’t had anything to hide behind except for a dividing wall with just enough space for him to cram himself behind. All the bodies were carefully disposed of, but the frequency of their patrols through the main corridors was starting to alarm Derek, especially considering they were still a long way off from the central cortex. Stiles kept a tight rota between Derek’s movements and his rest time, giving him spaces of between five and ten minutes at a time to recuperate and gather his bearings, something Derek was immensely grateful for. Working an assignment without backup, or access to contact with ARGUS, was more demanding and mentally taxing than he could have possibly guessed.

More than the operation, it was a shock to his system at how much confidence he invested in his AI partner. On his downtime, he was able to completely relax his guard, trusting Stiles’ abilities and choice of hiding area, where he could have his necessary time-out and stop his body from cramping from being wound so tightly. The facility was enormous, and, according to Stiles’ map, they weren’t even a quarter of the way through it. Moving at a snail’s pace was exhausting, and Derek immensely regretted assuming the mission would only take a couple of hours, and that he’d foregone using the six hours of their flight to sleep. Every atom in his body protested at being cramped and squeezed in the claustrophobic vents and service entrances where the Vu were sure to disregard. Derek promised himself that he’d visit the ship’s physicians and chiropractors after this was over, and get every knot and kink kneaded out of his poor limbs.

The automated doorways were another problem entirely. Derek still had to get Stiles plugged into the circuit boards to override the entry codes and open the doors to corridors. Once, Derek had to insert a cord directly into the very thin plastic siding of the microchip to plug Stiles into a terminal to ensure all ARGUS data on there had been wiped clean. Fortunately, it already had, but that didn’t stop Stiles from complaining about the manhandling.

“Jesus, Derek, this old power cable is doing _murder_ on my hard-drive chip!” he whined, perched on the flat surface of the table’s surface. “The least you could have done is bought me dinner first. Or warmed the electrical prong before inserting it.”

“Why do you even bother with innuendos, when we could be doing more important things?” Derek snipped back, his voice carrying an exasperated fondness to it.

“Who else is going to, around here?” the AI quipped, combing furiously fast through the visual display unit’s data. The small LED screen mounted in the table’s surface was crunching numbers at a dizzying speed, enough to make Derek’s eyes water. Derek noticed that, twice during the almost ten minutes of their scan, Stiles’ hologram flickered out of existence twice, as if it were an old, interrupted television signal.

“Everything going okay?” he asked, wondering if he should be worried. None of the other AIs had done this before in their service with him, but then again, he’d never needed them to do what Stiles was doing.

“Fine, fine,” Stiles waved his hand dismissively, staring down at the screen with its illuminated numbers as if it had personally wronged him. Which it probably had. “I just don’t like working with antiquated machines. You know how they joke that computers age in dog years? Well, it’s more like quadruple dog-years. Which makes it like… what? Twenty-eight years per year? That’s a lot of years, y’know, to put up with, getting shoved unceremoniously into old portals.”

“Uh huh.” Derek arched a brow, studying the smaller figure, hunched over in concentration. While Stiles had always been a chatty AI, it seemed that the longer they were in Zeta Base, the less Stiles chatted and the more he just outright babbled.

“Alrighty then. This VDU’s clean as a whistle. We’re gonna have to do this again if we come across anymore, but according to my data, there’s only a handful of them left before we get to the central core, and they’re all on the way anyway.” he spoke at last, dusting his blue-tinged hands together in front of him as the screen blinked off altogether. “We’ve got some good news and some bad news.”

Derek groaned. “What’s the bad news?”

“To get to the next area, we’re going to have to go through another really narrow air-vent that circumnavigated one of the heating systems of the station. It’s a pretty tight fit – you’re going to have to really squeeze yourself through. It’s not going to be fun.”

“And the good news?” he asked, not sure he wanted to know.

“The heating is off, at least?” Stiles shrugged, a hopeless, lopsided smile on his face. “And the tunnel’s not as long as the last one we had to crawl through – only a hundred and twelve feet.”

“That’s not much of a consolation, when you have to squirm through it like a worm,” Derek grouched, unplugging Stiles’ microchip and gingerly sliding it back into his suit.

“If it makes you feel any better, you’re the prettiest non-anthropoid invertebrate animal I’ve ever seen.” Stiles chuckled, and the timbre of his voice sent something warm blooming through Derek’s chest.

 

 

Stiles was right. The vent was so narrow that he was forced to jam his arms beneath his chest and wriggle his bulk through, one torturous inch at a time. Even worse, the chute slanted gradually upwards for the first few dozen feet, where it ran above the ceiling of the rooms it traversed. It was decidedly not fun – in fact, if Derek had to adequately describe the experience, he would say that it fucking sucked.

Even if the heating wasn’t on, the crushing claustrophobic sense of the exhaustion took its toll on Derek faster than the rest. It was stifling, and gruelling, and he wasn’t even a third of the way before his breath was coming out in fatigued rasps.

“Five minutes’ rest,” Stiles ordered through his helmet, “And I’m switching on the internal fans across the entirety of your suit.”

“I’m fine,” he gritted through his teeth, but it was useless, because the little shit ignored him anyway and took over the functions of Derek’s armour, activating the fans to cool him down.

“Dammit, Derek, your heart rate is skyrocketing, and we’re sandwiched in a tiny, cramped exhaust chute above a boiler room. Excuse me for looking out for your well-being,” he snarked, “But I’m not letting you broil alive under your plate armour, even if you _are_ worried about my battery wearing down. There’s still plenty of juice left in me yet.”

“AI battery check,” Derek bade, because after all was said and done, Stiles was _his_ partner, and he had to look after him too.

“Battery at eighty-two percent, estimated battery life two-hundred and eighty-six point zero-six hours remaining.”

“That’s come down a bit,” he remarked.

“It’s just ‘cause of these ol’ dinosaurs of computers that’s wearing me down,” Stiles said offhandedly, and Derek would pry some more, would pick through Stiles’ dismissive tone, but he was feeling so fucking _exhausted_ that all he could do was lie there and let the cool air of the fans blow over his body.

“Another seventy-six feet, Derek,” Stiles murmured softly, speaking in a gentle, placating tone. “There’s an air-conditioning terminal unit at the end of the corridor that you can stretch out in. We’ll get you there, and then you can stretch out and have a few good hours of sleep before we keep going.”

“I can’t just – sleep, Stiles.” he groaned, even as his voice cracked awkwardly halfway through.

“You have to, Derek,” his AI soothed, and for a moment Derek could imagine it was Stiles’ hands caressing his face, and not the currents of cooler air generated by the fans. “You’re exhausted. You haven’t slept, and it’s affecting your motor functions. The Vu won’t look in an air-conditioning terminal. I’ve still kept your suit vocal operations on mute. And I won’t be asleep – I’ll act as a sentry.”

As stubborn as Derek was feeling, Stiles had a point. After a few more minutes of rest, and once the fans had cooled his elevated temperature enough, Derek continued the miserable crawl forward. It was horrendously unpleasant, and by the time he dropped into the small, metal compartment, he was so worn-out that he almost collapsed.

Of course, because nothing ever went his way, Derek was somehow _too_ fatigued to immediately fall asleep, even after Stiles performed all the necessary armour checks and performed a quick scan of their surrounding area, ensuring no Vu were in the immediate vicinity.

“Remind me to ask for a payrise when we get back,” he sighed unenthusiastically.

“Duly noted,” Stiles chuckled, which, as tired as Derek felt, he couldn’t help but grin wearily back. However difficult their operation might have been, Derek felt satisfied in how he and Stiles had established such trust between them, where they had evolved from associates to, dare he say it, tentative friends.

Stiles gratefully acknowledged his exhaustion, because he carefully applied the front blind to the helmet and lowered the brightness of the halogen screen, giving Derek’s fatigued eyes some respite.

“You want anything?” he asked.

“Maybe some music?” Derek requested. “Turned down real soft. Something classical – my mom used to put it on whenever one of us couldn’t sleep as a kid.”

“Of course,” Stiles complied, quickly striking up a playlist and turning the volume right down, until the faint, soft strains of Bach’s Air on a G String swelled sweetly in his ears. It had an immediate effect, making his muscles lose their tense strain.

“Anything else?” Stiles inquired, hushed as if he were trying hard to not drown out the music. Like this, his voice so soft and tender, Derek wished, not for the first time, that he were back in ARGUS, not stuck in some godforsaken base full of enemy aliens. And that Stiles had been outfitted with an android shell, if only to feel a warm weight of a body beside him. It had been too long since he had.

“Talk? About anything, I don’t care.”

“Wow, I can honestly never say I’d have expected you to say _that_ ,” he chuckled, but then went on in his soft, soothing voice about – hell Derek didn’t even know anymore. Something about Scott, the things they’d done when they’d been partners. He wondered why he’d thought of Stiles as annoying – well, he knew the reason why, because sometimes Stiles seemed to try and cram as much sarcastic sass into every waking moment like it was his mission in life. But like this, in the dark, Derek figured he could get used to having an AI partner, have Stiles around him for a long, long time.

“I want to see the forests of Beacon Hills,” he whispered, in a tone thick with yearning.

“You will,” Derek murmured drowsily, “We’ll go hunting rabbits when we get back. Take a holiday.”

“You’d better be careful when talking like that, Derek, or people might think you’re secretly a soft-hearted guy,” Stiles said, his voice warm and fond.

Derek dropped off soon after that, his exhaustion getting the better of him. Stiles’ words were the last thing he heard before slumber overtook him, made all the clearer by the pause between songs.

“Sometimes, when I think about you… it makes my synapses send strange messages. I get the impression that, had I functioning human skin and sense receptors, you’d be… warm.”


	5. Chapter 5

Derek woke in stages, groaning softly as _Sul Aria_ from The Marriage of Figaro flowed in harmoniously through the earpieces of his helmet. His legs felt cramped from being folded at an awkward angle. His mouth felt like something had died on his tongue, numerous times. He turned his head and took a pull from the IDB straw, feeling only slightly better that the stale water was keeping him hydrated and alive, but regretfully, still with a gross taste in his mouth.

“G’morning, starshine! The Earth says hello!” Stiles chuckled, his boisterous voice somewhat softened by the situation they were caught in. Derek couldn’t help the smile that stretched across his lips, feeling a sudden swell of fondness for his AI. He didn’t even know when Stiles had gone from ‘ _the’_ AI to ‘ _his_ ’. He’d never really been one to fall asleep easily, not really put much thought into sleep other than lying horizontally on a flat surface and waiting for his body to catch up on the needed rest for him to fall into slumber. But Stiles – he was a comforting presence even in a stressful position, one that, ordinarily, Derek would have found too demanding to rest properly. But curled up in a cramped air-conditioning vent with his knees pressed awkwardly against his chest, Derek just felt the almost overwhelming need to have Stiles out, to have some semblance of company in the cold, constricted space.  
  
"Don't." Stiles warned, halting Derek's hand in the process of moving. "We don't know how well the vent is sealed. The light from my hologram could seep through the cracks and alert any possible Vu in the area. We can't risk it."  
  
Stiles was right, of course. He always was. Still, it didn't make the situation any better.  
  
"Don't fret your precious little heart, boo. Once the mission's over, we can spend a good few hours staring soulfully into each other’s eyes," the AI cooed.  
  
"Fuck, I take everything nice I ever said about you back."

“How considerate. While you were sleeping, I’ve been trying to get back in contact with ARGUS."

“Any luck?”

“None. The comms-blockers are still fucking us over. How’re you feeling?”

“Aside from hungry and the overwhelming urge to piss like a racehorse? Dandy.” He’d gone longer periods without food, and of course his suit was equipped with the technology to eliminate liquid and solid-waste by-products. Still, he always felt a little self-conscious of performing bodily functions while still in his suit. The only consolation, really, was that he didn’t feel the need to shit. And, at least the AIs were equipped to handle the entire situation with discretion and sensitivity.

“Well, I usually prefer to be wooed with dinner first, and I have to be honest, I’m not really into waterworks.”

Of course, Stiles had to be the exception. Of fucking _course_.

 

  
  
They encountered yet another Vu twenty minutes after shimmying out of the cramped vent (and the mortifying matter of waste elimination with an audience). The creature had been patrolling another corridor, and Stiles hadn't been able to find an alternate route around it. The altercation had been unlike Derek's usual style – what Stiles had affectionately named the 'Blast and Run', for his penchant to wield either his enhanced Lycan strength or the ray-emission pistol first and asking questions later.  
  
Unlike the previous three, this Vu hadn’t been distracted with a whittling block, mindlessly wandering the hallway, or busy scratching whatever parasites had wedged themselves between the insectoid’s plate-layered outer exoskeleton. This Vu must have been higher on the command food-chain – it was clacking along the corridor in a purposeful, alert manner, and its armour was less patchy in its vital areas. Derek had snapped the necks of the other Vu, but this one had a high metal band around its collar and up half of its face, attached to an obviously scavenged breastplate, effectively protecting it from his tactic. It didn’t have a gun, either, but there was a fucking nasty-looking blade-type weapon gripped in its talons.

“Well, fucking peachy,” he muttered, crouched awkwardly behind storage boxes in a tiny side room, the doorway broken open and dangling awkwardly from its hinges. The Vu paced the corridor in carefully-measured strides, passing in and out of his sight. “Looks like this one’s going to be a blaster.”

“What happened to the plan of being sneaky?” Stiles hissed in his ear. “If you fire your gun, there’s a high probability that others will hear it and come running.”

“How high?”

“ _Pretty freaking high!_ ” Stiles replied almost hysterically, his voice an octave (or three) higher than usual.

“I won’t miss,” he shot back, already fingering the quick-release snap on his gun’s holster. “I’ve been trained long enough to get a good shot in-”

“And then what, Derek? You’re going to blast your way through the rest of the base?” Stiles interrupted, voice wavering with outrage. The little blue label of Stiles’ _ACTIVE_ status blinked and fuzzed over with static on Derek’s electronic diode screen, making his eyebrows furrow in confusion, but Stiles’ fuming diatribe seemed to have only just begun. “I know just how perfect your aim can be, Derek, don’t forget that I hacked into the ARGUS mainframes to get your file and, subsequently, your performance records. You’re one of the best shots they have.”

“I feel like there’s a _but_ coming,” he found himself snarking, and yikes, maybe he was spending too much time around the AI if he was picking up his idiosyncrasies, or worse, instigating Stiles when he was already launching in what was probably going to be a spectacular tirade.

“ _Of course there’s a but!_ The only bigger but would be _you_ , you…  you _butt_!” Stiles spluttered.

“Why, Stiles, it almost sounds like you care, considering you’re usually so much more eloquent with your insults.” He grinned despite of himself, considering that having an enemy fifteen feet away was probably not the best of times to be having an argument with his AI.

“I only get like this because of you, you know! Of _course_ I care – probably way more than I should for a big stupid-head like you who wants to shoot everything in sight!”

“Stupid-head? Are you five?”

“ _Christ._ “ Stiles muttered under his breath something that sounded an awful lot like a curse word. “Just shut your mouth and use your Prog Knife.”

“The what?”

“The Pro – oh my _god_ have you ever even _used_ a Progressive Knife?”

“I’ve used plenty of knives in my combat classes, and I was best in class for Bowie and hissatu, and pakal method,” Derek shot back, feeling strangely defensive, heat blooming across his face. “Argent doesn’t give me as many weapons as the other Nauts because he considers my Lycan capabilities to be enough. Others use glaives or axes as their combat weapons, but I-”

“You usually just shift into Beta form, huh?” Stiles let out a huff of air, unimpressed with either Derek or the commanding officer (somehow Derek hoped it was the latter). “This isn’t your usual suit, is it?”

Blinking in surprise, Derek double-checked the serial number on the bottom-left of the screen. “No, this is one from stock. I think my other one was in for maintenance.”

“Activating hardware component scan.”

Derek resisted the urge to drum his fingers impatiently on the dirty ground he was crouched on, instead, he kept his gaze directly in front, watching the oblivious Vu pace past the doorway again. At least Stiles’ _ACTIVE_ icon had stopped flickering. He needed to remember to let the maintenance crew know about the malfunctioning helmet when they got back to ARGUS. _If_ they got back. He didn’t even pause to consider why Stiles hadn’t picked up the glitch in the su-

“Good news, big guy! You’re equipped with a Prog Knife!” Stiles chirped triumphantly. “Standard equipment of stock suits for mêlée combat. Just reach back to the right shoulder pylon, which I’ll open up for you, and grab the hilt.”

“The shoulder wha-?”

“The _pylon_! The – oh my _gooood_!” The frustrated whine of Stile’s voice was only marginally grating, considering Derek was suddenly stunned by the fact that he could feel a section of his armour _slide off his shoulder_.

“What the fuck are you doing?” he hissed, twisting his head around as far as he could without snapping his neck. A small section of plate had slid back (purposefully, it seemed, and thank god for that) on well-oiled hinges. Stiles must obviously have been taking measures to avoid making any kind of unwarranted noise, because rather than the swift click of something being deployed, the dark, solid shape of the knife handle was being extracted upwards with careful deliberateness. Ensuring that he was still hidden behind the crated and that the Vu’s footsteps were quiet and on the other end of the corridor outside, he reached back and extracted the weapon. In his hand, it was shaped like a standard Bowie, perhaps a half inch longer and a touch thicker than the standard military-issue, but the blade was a smooth, lustreless dark grey.

“So how exactly is a knife supposed to help when the Vu’s wearing such thick armour?” he asked, genuinely curious.

“You ever heard of _vibroblades_?”

“No. Is it some sort of new technology?”

“You and Scott, Jesus, what is it with me being paired with Nauts who’ve never watched _Star Wars_?” he chuckled. “Look it up on Wookieepedia later. They’re based on a similar idea. Almost all Naut suits are equipped with a Progressive Knife stored in the shoulder pylons as basic armaments. Basically, the blade vibrates at an extremely high, noiseless frequency, increasing its cutting sharpness to the point that it can cleave the matter of a target object at a molecular level.”

“So it’s a good knife, then?” Derek pressed a switch at the base of the pommel. If he didn’t have his Lycan senses, he probably wouldn’t have sensed the incredibly slight vibration coming through the handle.

“Cuts through just about anything like a hot knife through butter.”

 

 

Derek seriously doubted that the Prog Knife could cut through just about anything as easily as Stiles said.

But it did the job when he lodged it to the hilt on the underside of the Vu’s chin with enough force to shatter the metal band of the collar and almost sever the creature’s head entirely.

“Fuck – remind me to request a Prog Knife on my equipment list at all times,” he huffed, dragging it behind the crates and wiping the blade clean of the grey-green goop that constituted as Vu blood on the expired creature’s cloth coverings.

“Done and dusted!” Stiles laughed, the soft _ding!_ of a new reminder being created in the background. Derek pushed the knife back into its sheath on his shoulder, and Stiles wordlessly kept the pylon open and the guard up.

 

 

They were getting close to the central core of Zeta Base. Derek could tell, if not for the glowing map on the far-right corner of the halogen display inside his helmet, then because the Vu they were encountering were getting more and more well-equipped, and dangerous.

Disturbingly, Derek noted an odd change in Stiles. Despite having multiple practice runs in the simulator, Stiles seemed to be more distressed and on edge by the minute. Even more worryingly, he lapsed into complete silence and stopped making any jokes, which wouldn’t have seemed strange, except for the fact that Derek had spent enough time in Stiles’ company to know how completely unnatural that was. He noticed Stiles’ icon flickering with increased frequency on the inside of his helmet, and at first, he paid it no mind. But after disarming and unlocking three more sets of doors, he noticed his hologram looking slightly wan and fuzzier than usual, blipping out completely once or twice.

Stiles, of course, waved him off when he asked. “There’s a mission that we have to focus on to get our butts out of here in one piece,” he huffed, while Derek crawled carefully over a precarious metal beam stretched over a gaping hole in the floor. “We gotta get home so I can give Danny a good tongue-lashing about assigning me such a doofus-head. Sometimes I wonder what it’d be like to work in a respectable team, y’know? I mean, I get that Chief Argent is head honcho of all things military, and I haven’t worked with your uncle Peter but I’ve heard through the grapevine that he’s pretty good at what he does, though your sis is rumoured to be scary as fuck, and-”

“Stiles, _please_ stop babbling in my ear,” Derek hissed, trying to focus on keeping his weight balanced enough so as not to plummet the approximate sixty feet down.

“I’m pretty sure that if you fell, anyway, the suit would protect you from certain death with its shock-absorbers. You’d maybe get a couple of broken legs, maybe a busted spine if you fell like an untrained idiot and didn’t try to land properly, but I’m pretty confide-”

“ _Stiles_!” he barked, finally reaching the other side and letting out a breath he hadn’t noticed he’d been holding. The AI was usually chatty, but never like this, never out of control and half-fragmented into almost unintelligible gibberish. It was making him feel uneasy and on edge.

“Sorry, bro. My bad. It’s just that I got notice of possible dangers to you and I’ve been spreading myself out through the base’s system to keep tabs on all the Vu floating around and moving. I just got warning that an asteroid’s broken off a neighbouring belt and there’s, like, a small probability of it hitting the area where Zeta Base is stationed, so I’ve been running an algorithm to calculate the trajectory of it, you know, just in case.”

“What’s the probability of impact?”

“Oh, like, 0.00006%. It’s still a few thousand miles away, give or take. But I’m just running a triple-check in the background. Just in case. Yeah. You know, I don’t think the dust particles in the air around here are probably the healthiest right now, especially with the base having been offline for so long. Let me just check – yep, okay, your air filter’s working fine. I’m just going to go ahead and keep an eye on it.”

“Stiles.” Derek’s voice was low, fuelled by the long hours of being constantly vigilant, of sneaking around a base and being wound tight from the constant danger of discovery from Vu. “What’s going on with you?”

“Nothing’s going on, Derek,” the AI replied flippantly. “I’m just being a little extra cautious, especially since we seem to be getting close to the information hub.”

“Extra cautious? More like-” Something suddenly clicked in his brain, because he stopped his current question and - “Dust particles.”

“Excuse me?”

“You’re worried about dust particles. And an asteroid that has almost a zero per cent probability of hitting the station.”

“Technically, it’s a 0.000-”

“The point _is_ , Stiles – you’re worried about me.”

“Of course I am,” Stile replied, “I said it before, haven’t I? I feel like we’re rehashing our earlier conversation. I can’t very well get home if the vessel that’s holding my chip is a lifeless husk.”

“That’s not the point.” He gritted his teeth. “The point is, you’re worried about me. And not the mission. You still care about the mission, yes, but by analysing these ridiculously small, potential threats along with the obvious ones, you’re making _me_ more of a priority. Earlier, you talked about your ARGUS coding. Bring that conversation back up.”

“Derek-”

“AIs record every moment of their current mission to be played back at a specific time when requested, and for the higher ups to analyse later. Bring up the conversation about your coding.”

Stiles went silent for a moment, and then the _click-hum_ of file data being loaded sounded up. Stiles’ voice, slightly tinny from playback, echoed through his helmet.

_“The parameters of my coding mean that the success of the mission is valued and prioritised above all else. Including… including the safety of my own Naut partner.”_

“Derek, listen-”

“Stiles, what the fuck is going on.” He could feel dread building in his gut, an ugly, twisted feeling. “What aren’t you telling me? Your hologram keeps flickering when I plug you into the Zeta Base power cables. Your _ACTIVE_ icon comes on and off inside my helmet, and I _know_ it’s not a suit malfunction, because you’d have alerted me straight away about it. And you’re more worried about the possibility of me inhaling weird shit through the suit’s filters than locating the hub. What. Is. Going. On.”

“If I could-” Stiles began softly, sounding distressed, but before he had a chance to finish, an outraged bellow came from the far end of the room, and a shot rang out.

“ _Derek_!” Stiles yelled, as blinding pain shot in his arm.

 

 

“Mother _fuck-_ ” he hissed, tucking his elbows in and rolling to one side behind some metal sheets as another shot rang out. A fucking Vu had walked in on him and he hadn’t noticed it because he’d been too busy arguing with Stiles over semantics. He quickly disengaged the quick-release snap service weapon and armed it with a cocking motion, humming dangerously in his hands. The Vu was firing blindly, obviously unskilled with a gun, but making a goddamn racket as the shots rang deafeningly over metal surfaces. After so much silence, the din was so loud in his ears that he wouldn’t have been surprised if the guys back on ARGUS could hear it.

“Where is he?” he shouted over the pandemonium, back to yet another crate (why the fuck was this place so full of goddamn crates, his mind supplied unhelpfully).

“Behind you, eleven o’clock!” Stiles shouted back, reminiscent of how he acted in all those simulators, but none of the excited mirth in his voice. Derek pushed off of his stinging arm and swung his weapon over the metal sheeting, aiming for the direction Stiles had pointed him in. it was unerringly correct, and it took all of two shots from his ray-emission to fell the Vu. The silence that followed the altercation was almost as loud as the noise that had preceded it, and full of danger.

“Status report,” he ordered quickly.

“Shit. Shit shit _shit_. My sensors are detecting movement,” Stiles spoke quickly, the map in Derek’s periphery moving around and being dissected internally at dizzying speed. “There are Vu on the move. They’ve heard the commotion. _Shit_ , Derek.”

“What should we do?” He adjusted his grip on the gun with both hands, and hissed in pain when the sharp bite of pain lanced through his left bicep. He glanced over and saw a jagged crack in his armour from the gunshot, and the faint, wet gloss of blood seeping through the neoprene of the exposed undersuit.

“You’re injured.” Stiles said, a little faintly. “We need – okay. We need to get the fuck out of here. We need to hide. We don’t have much time. They’re going to be looking for where the noise came from, and even if we hide the body, they’re not going to miss the gunshot holes peppering every single surface of this room. That goddamn lousy shot.”

“Where can we hide?” Derek asked, keeping the gun trained on the door.

“Scanning the facility – okay. Okay. There’s a service door with a locked door on the other side of the corridor. We can cross it and I can unlock the thing in about fifteen seconds. Let’s go.”

They rushed out the door, Derek keeping his guard up and gun at the ready, and Stiles had the door open in moments. They had about eight minutes, tops, before the Vu found the room with their dead companion inside. Stiles used those precious eight minutes to lead Derek through an array of painfully tight alleyways, a short drop down through a constricted chute, and a quick belly-crawl under some pipes into an empty concrete ammo storage.

“They won’t find us in here, not for a long time.” Stiles assured him. “Enough for your arm to heal and to take a rest while we plan our next move. And for me to run diagnostics on your suit and activate the emergency patch-up on the plate underneath.”

“Sounds great,” Derek wheezed, the mission’s exertion finally taking a toll on him, “Because I am going to fucking pass out.”

And, as soon as Stiles assured him they were in the clear, he did.

 

When Derek blinked his eyes open, the stinging pain in his arm had subsided into nothing. Sitting up with a groan, he flexed his left arm experimentally, glad, for the millionth time, that his Lycan ability promoted faster healing than humans. The suit’s irregular fissure had been smoothed over by a fine mesh web of fibreglass, laid over the opening in regular weaves, a simple, automated repair from the suit. It was far from pretty, but at least it didn’t expose a chunk of his arm to the elements.

“How long have I been asleep for?” he croaked, wishing he could rub the sleep grit from his eyes. He felt exhausted.

“Only a little over an hour,” Stiles replied, his voice flat. “You weren’t hurt badly, but the shock of the impact, combined with your exhaustion, knocked you out pretty thoroughly.”

Derek frowned, hating how unemotional Stiles’ voice was. It didn’t sound right – not for someone usually so animated and expressive. “What’s wrong? Are there Vu around?”

“They’re searching the facility, moving around. My motion sensors can feel them patrolling the surrounding area of the room we were in, and buzzing around the central control dock like flies. But they haven’t gotten close to where you’re hidden – it’s pretty out of the way, and sealed off from the inside.”

Derek uncapped the slider panel on the front breastplate of his suit and pulled out Stiles’ microprocessor, holding the chip flat in the palm of his hand. Stiles was facing away from him, but there was no mistaking the dejected slump of his shoulders, or how he seemed to curl in disconsolately on himself. It was the first time he’d seen Stiles’ hologram since they’d left the ship. The two days had felt like two years.

“Stiles. What’s wrong?” he asked, genuinely perplexed. They’d wriggled out of a scrape, sure, but it hadn't been the first conflict Derek had been in, and certainly wouldn’t be the last in his military career. Compared to his previous altercations, this one hardly even rated on the scale. Even so, Stiles remained with his back to him, still except for a one-shouldered shrug that really didn’t convey anything.  “C’mon. Talk to me. And you say _I’m_ bad with words,” he tried for a joke, feeling stupid and lame. Stiles was the clever one of the two, it wasn’t Derek’s job to try making a situation lighter.

“It was my fault,” came the barely-intelligible mumble from his palm. He turned slowly on his chip, facing Derek, and the look of his tiny face was nothing short of miserable. It was as if his entire, tiny being seemed weighed down with devastation, as he wrung his hands and kept his eyes on the chip below his feet, decidedly not looking at Derek. “I feel like a fucking piece of trash. Like I should just be shoved into the machine shredder the minute we get back to ARGUS. What sort of Artificial Intelligence military-issue unit am I, if I can’t even keep tabs on an enemy because I was too busy arguing with my pilot?”

“It wasn’t even that bad, Stiles. We’ve had minor skirmishes a lot worse than this.” Derek tried to placate. He flexed his now-healed bicep to illustrate his point. “Look, my arm’s fine. See?”

“That’s not the point!” the AI cried, distressed. “What if you’d been human? What if the Vu had aimed six inches to its left and the plasma shot had gone between the plates of your breastplate? What if-”

“Stiles, I wasn’t thinking then either, okay? I wasn’t keeping my full attention on the mission. It’s a mistake that everyone makes, alright, and it’s a foolish one, but everyone does it. It’s only human.” He didn’t correct himself on the human part, because to him, Stiles was just as alive as he was, if not more. “And besides, that’s a lot of _what ifs_ that didn’t happen,” Derek smiled wearily. He was sweaty and felt gross and dirty, his armour was filthy, chipped in places and covered in flecks of Vu blood, but he was alive, and Stiles was standing on the tiny disc in his palm. And sure, they might have a bunch of pissed-off Vu searching for them, but they were alive, and if that wasn’t cause for feeling a little euphoric, he didn’t know what was.

“No, they didn’t happen.” Stiles agreed, his mouth still turned down at the edges, “But they _could_ have. And, as an AI, one of the more advanced types available, it was a possibility that shouldn’t have even occurred. I’m supposed to be looking out for you, Derek. I’m sorry. I’m a pretty sucky excuse for an AI.”

“Don’t say that. You’re-” he floundered for a moment, trying to express how grateful he felt for having such an accomplished AI partner – because Stiles was his _partner_ now. He wasn’t a temporary associate, not anymore, not after all they’d been through. He and Stiles… they worked well together. They clicked, better and more smoothly than any of the AIs he’d been assigned with in the past. “You’re great. Really… really great.” Wow, alright, that sounded completely lame. “Look at all the cool things you could do. You hacked into databases and can fly ships with hardly any thought. Much better than a stupid human and their limited abilities.”

“Hey now!” Stiles interrupted hotly, his stance changing into something more defensive, something more _Stiles_. “Don’t say that about humans! People are amazing!”

“Hardly,” Derek scoffed, acting indifferent while feeling pleased that Stiles seemed to be shaking off his melancholy. “Most of us are just bags of bones and spongy flesh. Lycans have slightly superior physical abilities, but we’re all still inferior to computers, or, hell, some of the other alien races out there.”

“Just a damn minute, Derek! I won’t have you ragging on humans. Humans are awesome!” Stiles bit back, releasing his worried grip on his hands and crossing his arms in front of him, staring up into Derek’s face. “Universes in science fiction in the past have often treated humans as the boring, everyman species, hell, even the weakest and dumbest. But when you think about the complexities of a human body, humans can be considered one of the most beautiful and hideous, terrifying species around.”

“I find that hard to believe.” Derek drawled, glad that his helmet was hiding his grin.

“It’s true! Just think about it!” And Stiles was off on another of his passionate tirades again, hands flying everywhere as he gesticulated madly to prove his point. “Ever heard of the guy who ate an entire Cessna 150 airplane? I mean, for God’s sake, people eat capsaicin for _fun_. They’ve got crazy bodies that are practically bioweapon factories – human bites can be fatally infectious to even other humans. Amongst terrestrial life, their endurance, shock resistance and ability to recover from injury are absurdly high compared to almost every other animal. They evolved from hyper-specialised pursuit predators, and there’s been mounting scientific evidence that primitive human ancestors would hunt large prey by simply following it at a walking pace, without sleep or rest, until it died of exhaustion – pursuit predation, they call it, the ability to outlast most other species.”

“Uh huh.”

“I’m serious! Where a simple broken leg will cause most species to go into shock and die, humans can recover from virtually any injury that isn’t immediately fatal. Even traumatic dismemberment isn’t necessarily a career-ending injury for a human. Look at most of the Nauts on ARGUS – so many of them have mechanical prosthetics in and on their bodies that have replaced limbs or organs damaged by battle. Humans can recover from injuries with extreme rapidity, recovering in weeks from wounds that would take other species months or years to heal. The results aren’t pretty, of course – humans have hyperactive scar tissue, among other survival-oriented traits, but even scars are highly functional.”

“Sure.”

“And let’s not forget _medical science_ ,” Stiles’ voice seemed to go up an octave again, arms spinning madly with a mixture of enthusiasm and defensiveness. “Humans developed surgery _centuries_ before developing even the most rudimentary anaesthetics or life-support machines! In extremis, humans have been known to perform surgery on _themselves_ , and _survive_. Thanks to humans’ extreme heartiness, the medical procedures they regard as routine would appear to most other species as inventive forms of murder! They even perform radical surgery on each other for purely cosmetic reasons! _Humans are literally Space Orcs_.”

“Space Orcs? That’s not a very nice way of looking at it.” Derek supplied. Stiles shut his mouth quickly, looking suddenly, terrifically embarrassed at being caught gushing over something so passionately.

“Oh, hush your mouth. I just really like science fiction, alright? And you're one to talk, obviously fishing for compliments.”

“You sound like a massive human fanboy,” he chuckled.

“ _Well,_ humans _are_ ridiculously awesome,” Stiles muttered, though Derek could tell the colouring of his face was flushing even darker. “And… if humans can be so impressive and amazing and do this much, why can’t Lycan Nauts do even more?”

Stiles rubbed his arm with an air of awkwardness, looking up shyly through his lashes at him, and Derek felt all the air leave his lungs, as if someone had punched him square in the belly. “Do you forgive me? For being a useless AI that can’t even sweep an area for Vu?”

“There’s nothing to forgive, Stiles.” Derek answered honestly. He reached out a gloved finger, and Stiles his own, tiny hand, as if somehow they could touch, but both stopped short. It was useless, trying to make physical contact with a hologram that had no physical matter.

“Well, that’s kind of freaking frustrating,” Stiles chuckled.

“It can’t be helped,” Derek murmured, though every fibre of his being seemed to want nothing more than to make that small, physical contact, despite never being tactile with anyone that wasn’t his family. “We’ll figure something out once we get out of here. We’ll head back to ARGUS, and then I’ll finally invoke some of my vacation hours and we’ll take that trip back down to Earth to my house, to see the lake and the grotto.”

“The what?” Stiles asked, his lopsided smile never moving on his face.

Derek went cold all over, as if somebody had poured a bucket of iced water over him.

“The grotto.” He repeated it, leaning forward and staring at Stiles’ holographic representation with narrowed eyes. “The one with the initials carved into the rock wall.”

“I’m sorry, I don’t remem-”

“ _Stiles!_ ” he barked, suddenly equal parts furious and concerned and shocking the tiny figure into silence. All the unusual things he’d noted since leaving the ship suddenly flooded to the forefront of his mind, drowning out all other thoughts.

Stiles’ _ACTIVE_ icon blinking off at moments when he was under duress.

Stiles’ hologram appearing washed out and flickering on and off like badly-tuned static when he was plugged into Zeta Base ports, running keygens.

Stiles’ babbling, unfocused speech, and the change of his focus on their mission, prioritising his safety over the completion of their assignment.

Stiles forgetting something Derek has said, something he considered important.

“I want you to tell me the truth, Stiles,” he growled, feeling as though a hand was gripping the inside of his chest in a vice-grip, squeezing and squeezing and _crushing_ his lungs. “No evading the question, no bending the truth. As your partner and Naut, you need to trust me with this information. Why have you started acting like this? Why is your memory not working properly? Tell me the _truth_.”

“It’s _classified_ ,” Stiles’ face literally crumpled, but Derek was too far gone with rage and worry to see that hurt, devastated look on Stiles’ face and care. “I would tell you if I could, but I was put under strict instructions by Doctor Mahealani to-”

“So you’d rather obey orders than trust your own partner?” Derek demanded, the roar of his blood loud in his ears. “I’m worried about you, can’t you see that? I need to know what’s going on.”

“Derek, _please_ , don’t make me choose between my duty and my sense of faith in my partner.”

“You have a twisted sense of loyalty to believe that,” he spat, looking away in disgust. “Or maybe it’s just how you were programmed at ARGUS, to follow their orders above all else.”

Stiles kept his eyes lowered, looking ashamed and twisting his fingers in a fidgety manner. At any other point in time, Derek would have felt like a heel for making Stiles feel that way. But he was brimming with too much anger, too much hurt, to care.

“Stiles.” He spoke coldly, ignoring the way the tiny AI looked up quickly, a hopeful expression on his face.

“Yes?”

“Command authorisation code 5, manual override. Tell me the truth – why are you acting abnormally.”


	6. Chapter 6

The very last thing Derek wanted to see was the awful, glazed expression on Stiles’ face as the command overrode the AI’s basic functions and forced him to tell the truth. But, as they were, nothing seemed more important than learning the truth.

He expected Stiles to immediately launch into an explanation. Instead, he stood still on the microchip base, slowly uncurling his body from its previous posture until his spine was straight and his arms were lax against his sides. Stiles’ expression had smoothed over to a neutral appearance, though Derek could see there was resignation written in each pixel of his hologram.

“Would you like to access prior ARGUS military records on the Artificial Intelligence Project?” he intoned.

“Show me everything.” Derek replied, the rage all but gone now, replaced with a sick sort of feeling at how easily Stiles seemed to be giving up this obviously sensitive information. Usually Nauts were denied access to ARGUS records of any kind.  
  
"Acquiring visual data. Retrieving relevant video footage,” Stiles replied, and then his body blinked completely out of sight. Derek startled, suddenly worried that his command had broken his partner, or fucked something up. Immediately, though, a small screen flickered into existence, similar to the television flat-screens at ARGUS. He’d forgotten that AIs could project things other than their holographic representation from their chips – Stiles had always shown him information and maps on the surface of his helmet visor, and the last time he’d worked with an AI that had done that, it had been years. Even if he and Stiles had only been working together for a little while, it felt like a lot longer.

A small line of script appeared beneath the blank display – the location of the ARGUS home base back on Earth, and the date, some twenty years prior. Derek shifted the microchip and laid it flat against the top of the crate beside him, the screen just a little below eye-level. And, shifting his arm to relieve the slight cramp he still felt, he watched intently as the old records were accessed, slightly grainy as they played across the screen.

 

 

A man was standing at the head of a table in a meeting room, posters and easels with graphs and technical drawings at his back. Derek couldn't read the name-tag pinned to his lab coat's pocket, but he could tell the video was in a time before him. Gerard Argent, the hard-nosed military commander father of his current ranking officer, who had (much to the relief of everyone who'd had the misfortune of ever interacting with him) passed away in Derek's first year of service, sat in one of the chairs at the table. Looking quite a few years younger than he remembered, Derek's guess was confirmed when the date appeared below the screen, placing the video some twenty-five years prior.  
  
"Explain to us again why we should bother to invest good military money on a bunch of microchips and wires instead of real, tangible things, more important things, like weaponry," Argent commented sardonically, drumming his fingertips against the surface of the table. Derek wasn't surprised to see that Argent had always been a self-assured bastard, and his attitude hadn't been a recent development. The only upside was that Derek had only needed to suffer through less than a year under his orders, even if those ten months had felt like a decade. Gerard’s successor, Chris Argent (and Derek’s current boss boss) was strict as fuck and had boundary issues aplenty, but at least he was passable enough to spend more than two minutes at a time with in his presence without Derek regretting all of his life choices. Even if he smiled like someone had once described the action to him and he didn’t quite get it.  
  
"The Naut suit technology has remained virtually unchanged since its inception," the man in the lab coat was saying, splaying his hands over the paperwork on the table. His voice seemed less than patient, as if he'd been explaining himself for quite a long time. "And while it's... creditable that our department had excelled in technology and armament enough that the suits have barely changed in the four years since they came off the assembly line, there is always room for improvement."  
  
"We understand the concept of your design, Doctor Harris," a woman with skin the colour of mocha and full lips spoke, her hands folded over her folder, the same folder placed in front of each person seated at the table. "And the concept itself is, in one word, quite remarkable. But you must understand, the cost to fund an Artificial Intelligence program is astronomical, almost on par with the cost of our military budget."  
  
"Madam Chairman, I can understand your scepticism. This program hasn't been tried anywhere else on Earth, although similar androids have been created by our team. The science has been proven, and, like all technical programming, can only evolve and improve with time." The man – Harris – picked up his remote and clicked the button, changing the screen to another slide. A familiar-looking microchip filled half of the board, a human-shaped silhouette beside it with technical drawings.  
  
Derek swallowed heavily, suddenly realising what Stiles was showing him, why the entire thing had been niggling at a distant memory of learning this so many years ago from the beginning. The man with the familiar-sounding name giving the presentation was Adrian Harris, the leading scientist who pioneered the Artificial Intelligence program at ARGUS. This was the famous presentation where it was rumoured that Harris and Argent senior had almost come to blows afterwards.

Stiles was showing him the birth of the AIs.  
  
"The AIs will be created to be the ultimate companion to Nauts, both in the field and off. As we are now, the Nauts receive information and transmissions directly from base. But the AI would combine dozens of functions into one simple, interfaced platform.” He brought out a case from a pocket of his lab coat and extracted a chip, not unlike Stiles’ AI one – if somewhat larger, clunkier and slightly less refined – and laid it on the surface of the table for the board members to inspect. “We’ve already made progress in leaps and bounds with our unfinished prototype. In less than a year’s research, the base program has improved threefold.”

A few taps of his fingertips brought the hologram to form, rotating slowly on its overlay with its arms to the sides. It was a female model, obviously the first of its kind – the body and face weren’t as smoothly human-looking as the rest of the AIs Derek had come into contact with, looking more like a computer game character than anything natural.

“Sounds to me like you’re just interested in the grant to build fancy-looking pocket calculators.” Gerard sniped, his arms crossed and looking about as impressed as he could, which, Derek noted, wasn’t. At all.

“This is our first AI, Eve,” Harris continued determinedly, somehow managing to both ignore and give Argent the stink-eye (which was probably what spurred the almost-punch-up afterwards). “As you can see, her design is still crude, but the technology we’ve implemented is years ahead of anything we’ve managed to produce before. They are developed on an ANN, an Artificial Neuron Network, system, where their computational models are inspired by cerebral central nervous systems capable of machine learning and pattern recognition.”

“Please, Doctor Harris, in simpler terms?” the Chairwoman smiled patiently, though it was obvious her interest had anything but waned by her body’s attentive posture.

“In simpler terms, they are complex, multi-functional software that evolve and learn with time. During manufacture, they can be run through simulators that will advance their experience, but in essence they are as capable of learning as the human brain. Their encounters and involvement in their partnered Naut’s assignments mean that, while they have a guideline and parameters they must adhere to in missions, their more ‘human’ knowledge acquired in the field will give them a tactical edge.” Even Derek could tell that, despite Harris’ perma-sour countenance, he was more than passionate about his project. “What we’re hoping to develop is a program that continues the learning process well after its completion. A digital organism that gathers knowledge with time, grows and progresses with its colleague to produce a more effective partnership.”

“Aren’t you worried about the possible implications these AIs could cause, Doctor?” another member of the board asked, though by the manner in which every member present – save for the taciturn Argent senior – were flicking through their handouts, the presentation had achieved what had set out to do. “An artificial intelligence unit with no limitations of knowledge or learning. That could be a disaster waiting to happen.”

“Which is all the more reason why ARGUS will keep a close eye on the experimental units, and report all data to the higher-ups,” Harris assured, switching off the AI – Eve – and tucking his hands into the coat’s pockets. “The AI program will become a quintessential compound of the ARGUS task force. We’re hoping that in less than ten years, every Naut will have an AI assigned to them as a combat partner.”

“Your aspirations are high, Doctor Harris, and more than a little ambitious,” the Chairwoman nodded, closing the file. “However, paired with the content brief you’ve given me, I’d be a fool to shut down the operation before it began, especially with so many possibilities presented to us. Very well – I’ll award you the grant for the program.”

The video stopped on Harris’ triumphant smirk and Gerard’s furious expression, before blinking black and switching to a new screen.

 

 

The next video followed immediately after, set in a laboratory piled high with wires, circuit breakers and all manner of technological bits and pieces that Derek had no idea of their purpose. The corridors outside the lab were dark, and most of the overhead lights were switched off, meaning that the man was obviously working overtime. The scientist was hunched over a desk shoved in one corner, looking haggard and a little worse for wear, hair sticking out on one side as if he'd scratched at his scalp with frustration, heedless of his formerly-neat hairstyle. He was typing away furiously at a touch-key pad, connected to a chip by a thick coil of wires, the numbers and coding flashing at a terrifically fast pace on the illuminated screen before him. The figures written beneath the video dated it as a little over two years since the previous one, since the grant had been approved by the board members.  
  
Harris seemed so absorbed in his task that he didn't seem to notice when the doors hissed open and a woman strode into the room, clutching two paper cups in her hands. His typing never faltered, even as she reached his desk and daintily placed the cup near his elbow. Harris merely continued inputting code one-handed as he snatched up the beverage and downed it quickly, tossing the crumpled cup over his shoulder to join the small pile already gathered there.

“You’re working too hard again,” she spoke softly, her composed face giving nothing away. “You need to take some time to rest, before you burn yourself out.”

“I’ll rest when this is perfected,” Harris snapped. The woman sighed, leaning her hip against the edge of the desk.

“Adrian, you’re going to burn yourself out at this rate,” her tone neither placating nor worried, but merely observing. “If you keep going the way you are, you’ll end up writing a shit piece of code, and then nothing will work properly. You don’t want another Eve on your hands, do you?”

“ _Don’t_ mention that failure in my presence, Marin,” Harris barked viciously. “The new AI will be _nothing_ like her!”

“It _will_ be, if you don’t take your time with it and do it _right_ ,” the woman – Marin – retorted. “Now, take a few minutes to rest before you pass out from exhaustion. Or I’ll wipe the data from your drive when you eventually pass out. You know I’ll do it.”

“I know,” Harris agreed suddenly, all the fight escaping him like air from a balloon. Marin put the second cup down in front of him with a knowing nod, and Harris sipped at its contents morosely, staring at the screen with a disappointed expression.

“I take it the AI program isn’t going well?” she asked.

“It’s going spectacularly,” the other replied, taking his glasses of and running his hands over his face tiredly. “The AI matrix we’ve come up with is, to date, the most sophisticated piece of technology we’ve been able to create in history. The AIs record a staggering amount of data, and the expansion of knowledge in their databank grows almost exponentially from the moment we begin putting them through their training modules. It’s more than any of us could have hoped to dream of.”

“But then Eve happened.”

“Yes,” he muttered bitterly, staring into his cup with his lips pinched. “Eve happened.”

“You know, I never actually got to find out what happened.” Marin moved to half-sit on the desk’s surface, crossing her legs at the ankles and leaning on its surface with her hands. “News trickles pretty slowly down the food chain. Someone in the health department of ARGUS doesn’t really get much gossip from the techy side of things.”

“You really want to know how spectacularly Eve failed?” Harris snorted.

“Well, I wouldn’t put it like _that_ , but sure. Colour me curious. All I heard was that the AI prototype was in a research lab one minute, and then deactivated completely. So.” She crossed her arms and looked at him expectantly. “Tell me what happened.”

“Eve Overclocked.” Harris replied simply, frowning deeply and swirling the contents of the cup.

“For one minute, please pretend I don’t waste hours of my life every day learning complex code words for a department I hardly ever step foot in,” she snarked in reply, rolling her eyes and snatching the cup out of Harris’ hands. She took a swig of its contents, and pulled a face. “Ugh. I don’t know how you can stomach your coffee this way. I feel like I’m drinking battery acid.“

“Well, at least it’s better than the way you take yours - like making love in a canoe.”

“Like what?”

“It’s fucking close to water,” Harris nodded seriously, keeping a straight face even as Marin came strikingly close to executing a spit-take.

“That was _terrible_ ,” she wheezed, glaring at the smirking man.

“And yet true,” Harris took his cup back and drained its contents in one drawn-out sip, tossing the empty receptacle into the overflowing trash bin beside him.

“When we first tossed up the ideas of AIs in the lab, we hadn't planned on them having a specific life expectancy,” Harris sighed, crossing his arms and leaning back in his chair. “All technology, mind you, has an expiration date. Technology, in itself, improves at a near exponential rate once created. We were expecting this, of course, and I believed there was a way I could get around it by updating the software on a regular basis. But I was wrong.”

Marin’s brow furrowed. “What happened?”

“In short – Eve did everything I expected her to, and more. She was more powerful than any microprocessor created. Her knowledge grew and evolved with time. But no matter what we did, no matter how many updates we created or software expansion additions we built, it just – she couldn’t handle it. She destroyed herself by Overclocking.”

“How is it possible to destroy yourself?” the other asked, gesturing curiously with her hand. “From what I know, machines that have been programmed with artificial intelligence have at least a modicum of self-preservation.”

“Interestingly enough, it’s quite a fascinating process,” Harris said with a wry smile. “It seems as if it’s an unavoidable flaw inherent in their creation – other prototypes prior to Eve have exhibited the same progression. Over time, the AI’s ability to learn and expand with knowledge eclipses their software’s operational frequency. The development – what we call Overclocking – is a deteriorative and degenerative, crazed state of the chip. While Overclocking improves the hardware’s operation, and, in turn, the AI’s performance, it ultimately leads to the AI’s memory maps becoming too widespread and interconnected.”

“Which means what, exactly?”

“Well, once Overclocked, the AI is rendered useless. It acts irrationally, and it becomes defective to the point that it presents a threat to the Nauts on the mission by being unable to follow Asimov’s Three Laws of Robotics, or becomes altogether inoperative. In essence, Overclocking is comparable to an AI’s death.”

“So it becomes sick? Like – it contracts an irreparable virus or something?”

“Hardly, though Overclocking can also be induced through methods such as viral corruption. The AI basically ‘thinks’ itself to death. Eve gathered so much information so fast that her processors couldn’t keep up with her thirst for knowledge. In less than a year and a half after her birth, Eve burnt herself out. She –” he faltered for a moment, as if trying to distance himself from the emotions he’d invested in the project, and in Eve. “Their symptoms include the hologram flickering, due to the increased power consumption which generates more heat and is unable to be dispersed for the chip to remain operational, as well as memory loss and ‘personality’ change.”

“And there wasn’t anything you could do to fix her?”

“No.” Harris’ answer was decisive, his face hard. “Nothing we did could fix her. I’ve been working on extending their life expectancy for months, but none of my programming seems to have made a marked difference. I think that, in time, I can extend the functional capabilities of regular AIs for a lifetime, something between seventy to eighty years.”

“You say ‘regular’ AIs? So you’re not talking about military-issue ones?” Marin picked up, swirling the now-cold dregs of her watery coffee around in the bottom of the cup.

“Correct. The regular AIs, while still highly functional units, are little more than glorified paper-pushers and walking smart tablets. They’re fantastic for data storage and problem solving, don’t get me wrong, but have nowhere near as much processing power as the military grade AIs.”

“Which Eve was.”

“Yes. Which Eve was,” he agreed. He tapped the surface of the desk, frowning. “Military AIs used for the field have much shorter lifespans. They use so much more processing power that they pretty much burn themselves through with work. I keep running into blocks when I try to increase the processing power of the chip. I can make adjustments in the coding, and add more hardware, but there’s only so much I can do. Overclocking seems to be the unavoidable outcome for all AIs in the end. The most I seem to be able to do is stall the end for as long as I can. Not a ‘life expectancy’, per se, but more of an estimation of the time until they succumb to Overclocking.”

“How long do you think you can extend them to?” Marin asked.

“Regular AIs? Fifty years minimum, more if we can solve the problem of external power feeds. I have a young kid, Daniel, that’s just started with our department. He’s superbly intelligent for his age – he’s working on prototype android bodies to house the chips. If it works, they could go up to eighty.”

“And military-issue AIs?”

“A fraction of the time, if that.” Harris blew out an exasperated breath and threw up his hands. “Even if I _were_ to pull a miracle out of thin air, there’s no way I can increase their running time to longer than six or seven years, eight at most.”

“That’s not entirely bad, though,” she conceded. “Nauts have a maximum of seven years in the force. If you managed to get an AI running long enough, they could stay with the same Naut partner for the entirety of their national service.”

“That’s what I’m hoping happens,” he nodded, tapping idly at the keyboard on the desk. “Even if they only last seven or so years, they wouldn’t be able to retire like their Naut partners, though – they’d just exhaust their powers, and break.”

“That’s kind of sad, in a way,” she mused.

“That’s robotics, Marin.” Harris turned back to the desk, booting up the screen turned dark with its screensaver. “Robots wouldn’t care that their time runs out – they don’t have the feeling.”

 

 

The video cut off, then, after a moment of blackness, another started up right after.

 

 

“This is a new one,” Harris remarked, eyeing the holographic projection that had been placed in front of him. A younger-looking Danny Mahealani stood to one side, hands folded behind his back and looking rather proud.

“I used a slightly more advanced algorithm when creating this one,” the younger scientist smiled. “I was working on a more progressive model than the previous six of batch eleven, one with greater sophistication in its processing.”

“The hologram is certainly… unique,” Harris scowled, turning the immobile AI to one side, and then another, peering down his nose at it. “I’m aware that, since gaining full funding on the AI Project, we’ve been endeavouring to make them more – relatable. But he looks just like a regular boy, nothing close to the polished models we’ve been coming up with.”

“Every AI is unique, sir, and this one – I believe it could really be something special.” Danny smiled beatifically down at the little projection. “I must say that I’m rather proud of this creation of mine.”

“I hope working on this AI in particular hasn’t detracted you from your work on the android shells,” Harris muttered, moving his attention away from the chip and focusing again on fiddling with the microprocessor in his palm.

“Not at all, sir. My team is still ahead of schedule with them. I can assure you that the first presentation to the board will still be on time, and with greater results than anybody could have imagined.”

“As long as you keep your team on top of their work, then I don’t really care what you decide to tinker away with in your spare time.” He scrutinized the projection over the top of his glasses again, looking a few years older and showing every day of his age. “I suppose he has some fancy biblical name to make up for his extraordinarily-normal appearance? They’ve already gone through most of the popular ones – I believe the current trend in the labs is working through the celestial Christian angelic hierarchy. The archangels’ names are taken, so what’s this one’s name? Hofniel? Barakiel? Rogziel?”

“I actually got help naming him from one of the men downstairs. Officer Stilinski, in fact, the drill sergeant from the old-”

“Yes, yes, the ‘Sheriff’, as people call him. So what monstrosity of a moniker did you saddle on the damn thing?”

“ _Sławomierz Czibor Stilinski_. It means great glory, to fight with honour, which I thought was pretty fitting. Had to practice is a few times to get the pronunciation right.” Danny beamed with pride. “He’s not finished, of course, but another week or two and he’ll be ready for activation and integration into the training and simulation programs, and then assigned to a Naut after that.”

“Swah-? _Christ_ almighty, just what you needed, Mahealani, another unpronounceable name on the force. Just – go do whatever it is you were doing, and don’t forget to send me your progress report at the end of the week.”

“Will do, sir.”

 

 

“Nice of you to drop by, Danny. Congratulations on finishing the android project.”

“Thanks, Alan. Always happy to make a stop at the training simulators, even if the last month has been hell.”

“I’ll bet, what with finalizing the paperwork on the construction logistics, and handing over blueprints for dozens of different android shells.”

“Tell me about it. The larger cyborg-based androids were easier, because one blueprint of each model is enough, but the humanoid androids? They have to be specially-designed and unique to match the hologram, so each android needs a unique set of design plans.”

“Sounds like a lot of hard work. Still, it’s good to see you in one piece.” He patted the younger scientist on the shoulder warmly, and then turned back to his work.

“How’s Sławomierz going with the simulators?” Danny asked, while Deaton typed up digits quickly on the tablet.

“Stiles is going fantastically. I have nothing but glowing praise for him.”

“Stiles?”

“Sławomierz came to the conclusion that his name was too difficult to pronounce as a whole, especially when faced with a mostly English-speaking crew. So now it’s Stiles. It was originally supposed to be an abbreviation of the Stilinski surname, but now it’s short for something else. He made up a pretty good acronym to go along with it too.”

“And who decided this?” Danny asked with wide eyes.

“Believe it or not,” Deaton chuckled, amusement written over his face, “It was Stiles.”

 

 

“My name is Sławomierz Czibor Stilinski, but the preferred name is Stiles. I will be your military-issue Artificial Intelligence unit partner for your term of service as a Naut aboard the ARGUS.” Stiles’ speech pattern was a little stiff and formal, nothing like the easy casualness of his usual voice.

“Cool,” the youth grinned, holding the microprocessor in the palm of his hand. He was impossibly young-looking, with dark hair and a slightly uneven jawline, and a saccharine-sweet smile that complimented his amiable appearance. “Looks like you and I are going to be partners from now on. My name’s Scott.”

“Scott McCall, Lycan unit four, assigned to section 2-B. I have your information and statistic file downloaded to my memory.”

“Awesome – that saves a bunch of boring backstory. Let’s go get my stuff settled into my room properly, and then we can get to know each other better. ”

 

 

“I can’t believe how hard the training modules are, man!” Scott whined, slithering onto the bed. His precision-made sheets were slightly untucked in one corner of the mattress, and his hair was shorter, a more military-style cut. “I know Lycan Nauts are supposed to be better than regular guys in terms of speed and strength, but that doesn’t mean they’re allowed to wring us out like sponges.”

“Don’t blame me! We had Module 8B – I freaking _hate_ Module 8B!” Stiles’ disembodied voice croaked in protest from the ChipGuard around Scott’s wrist, twisted and pinned at an awkward angle beneath Scott’s torso, which couldn’t have felt comfortable in the least.

“Commander Argent _hates_ me,” Scott whined piteously. “I thought I was doing really well until the bit with the ground spikes.”

“And the grenade that came after it,” Stiles continued. “And the exploding shells that booby-trapped us in the corner office.”

“Why were we even _given_ that Module, anyway?” he grouched. “We’ve only been in training a few months, 8B is _way_ too advanced for someone like me to get through.” Scott groaned and buried his face into the pillow. “If I wasn’t so hell-bent in rubbing Argent’s face in it when I graduate into full service, I’d just quit now. _And_ we have to go to the assembly in the mess hall to meet the Commander’s visiting family, and I don’t wanna go, I’m just going to be standing there like a doofus while he makes everybody else in the unit feel important and good except for me.”

“Cheer up dude,” Stiles offered, voice still muffled with the bedding. “Even if Argent’s family end up being even bigger turds than him, well… at least they’re serving sloppy joes and mozzarella sticks in the cafeteria.”

“I don’t feel like it.” Scott’s voice was the epitome of misery.

“They’ve got tater tots,” Stiles sing-songed.

“… Yeah, alright.”

 

 

“What the heck kind of music are you playing?” Stiles asked, his voice unimpressed as Scott tapped the end of his pencil in rhythm along with the small player on the desk, the papers of his latest assignment strewn around him.

“It’s classic rock. My mom listens to it all the time back home when she and the other nurses are doing long night-shifts. They, like, totally have a little rock-out party in their scrubs. I used to pretend to be the drummer when she had to take me with her on the night shifts when I was a kid and Gina couldn’t babysit me ‘cuz she had an exam or something the next day.”

“I know what classic rock is, Scott, I’m a supercomputer.” Stiles crossed his arms over his chest, looking completely unimpressed. “What I meant is, doesn’t that music get distracting?”

“No, not really. Hey Stiles, what’s a synonym for ‘lustrous’?”

“Shiny, glossy, radiant, gleaming, shimmering, gliste- wait, what do you need it for? Your assignment’s on tactical warfare and the different techniques between hand-to-hand combat and artillery.”

“Yeah, I’m like, halfway through it. I just want to make sure I have something nice to say to Allison about her hair next time I see her at the weapons range.”

“Something tells me that you’re going to be spending a lot more time on writing poetic dumbassery about the newest addition to the artillery range than actually focusing on your work,” Stiles grumbled in reply, but it was easy to see he was speaking fondly.

 

 

The videos were coming faster and faster now, fragmented snippets of Stiles’ existence alongside his Naut partner, Scott. Derek’s head spun, but, similar to watching a car crash, he was unable to look away.

 

 

“I still can’t _believe_ that actually happened.”

Scott was lying in the infirmary, left arm and right leg in heavy casts, his leg elevated and making him lie awkwardly on the bedding.

“Scott, dude, you’re in the _military_.” Stiles’ chip was lying on the bedside table, the little hologram looking exasperated. “You’re being trained in warfare – didn’t you think that, I dunno, maybe sometime in the course of your military career you’d actually be called for actual enemy interaction?”

“I’ve never been in a hospital before,” Scott grumbled. “I mean, I’ve been in one plenty of times when hanging out with my mom, but never as a patient. Now I know why people in hospitals are always grumpy or miserable and can’t wait to get out. It smells weird and it’s hella uncomfortable. _And_ I sorta need to pee, but I don’t like the way that weird nurse guy was looking at me, like I kicked his puppy or something.”

“Yeah, Greenberg’s a bit of a weirdo. Broken bones are one thing, Scotty-boy, but even Lycans need a few days to recover from multiple fractures and fissure splints from plasma guns. Look on the bright side, though,” Stiles waved to the small pile of unopened containers beside him, “Look at all the pudding cups you get!”

“A great lot of good those’ll do me, when I’m stuck here for like an entire week without being able to– ” A tapping on the door outside silenced the two, and then a young woman with an exceedingly pretty countenance walked in, cheeks tinged pink with shyness.

“Allison! Hey! Hi! How’re you?” Scott beamed avidly, his expression a complete turn from what it had been moments ago. “What are you doing here?”

“I got your room number from one of the nursing staff outside,” Allison smiled, tugging on the hem of her knitted sweater with fidgety fingertips. “I didn’t – I wasn’t asking to be intrusive or anything. I just wanted to thank you for helping out my dad on the last mission. You…” she ducked her head, swallowed what seemed to be a lump of equal parts nervousness and some other undefined emotion. “He told me you stepped in front of the blast meant for him. He’d be in terrible shape if it hadn’t been for you.”

“It wasn’t a big deal, honestly,” Scott replied, sounding not the least bit arrogant, but instead wholeheartedly honest. “Lycans heal faster than humans. And Commander Argent – he’s important to the team. He keeps us all together in formation. It was my duty, and I’d do it again, really.”

A long, drawn-out silence stretched between the two young people, where Stiles played a furious game of eyeball-tennis between them, while Allison and Scott took turns in trying to out-dimple each other. Finally, after what seemed like a near eternity, Allison seemed to strengthen her resolve and dragged a chair from against the wall over to Scott’s bedside.

“You’re terribly brave,” she murmured, brushing her fingers against Scott’s uninjured hand.

“Do you like pudding cups?” Scott asked, making actual heart-eyes.

“ _Aaaaand_ this is my cue to switch off into power-saving mode,” Stiles added.

 

 

“How is this real life?” Scott asked, his jaw slack and legs in an inelegant sprawl over his bed.

“Beats me, dude.” Stiles replied, equally as dumbfounded as he stood opposite Scott, chip skewed awkwardly over the messy covers of the bed. Scott’s military jacket lay between them, a shiny new squadron leader patch emblazoned on the right shoulder. “Although… it _could_ have something to do with your troop members voting you as squadron leader? Just a thought, though, don’t quote me.”

“How have you learnt so much sarcasm in only three years?” Scott marvelled. “Actually, I don’t want to know, please don’t tell me.”

“I’m a technological marvel,” Stiles preened.

“Dude, I don’t even know how to feel about this. How did Commander Argent let this happen? I was so sure he _despised_ my guts.” He grasped the jacket with both hands, pulling it closer to him while simultaneously handling it like a particularly venomous reptile. “This is a huge thing. We’re talking like a _massive_ thing. I was so sure that Jackson was gonna get it. Or, you know, someone who’s been in the team for a while.”

“You’re not exactly new, you know,” Stiles reasoned. “I mean, it’s been three and a half years since you started. You’re not entirely as green as you think you are. Plus the guys in the squad _chose_ you to lead them, so obviously you must have a redeeming quality floating around somewhere in that mess of Allison-marshmallow you call a brain.”

“Gee, thanks, buddy, I’m practically drowning in the sea of positive reaffirmations.”

“Anytime, buddy ol’ pal. Also, I think Commander Argent’s finally accepted this turn of events after realising that, a year on, he’s probably never gonna get rid of the weird mollusc that’s so ardently limpeted onto his daughter. You know the saying about keeping your friends close, yada yada yada. But seriously, though, why are you freaking out?”

“Because!” Scott moaned, cradling the jacket between his arms. “I don’t feel like I deserve it. I’m really young, Stiles.” His voice went soft and quiet for a moment, almost fearful. “I’m only twenty-one. And now I’m supposed to be in charge of a dozen men? I mean, I was expecting maybe being NCO at the most, but this…”

“I’ll admit, it’s daunting, but Scotty, I couldn’t think of anybody better suited to the position. Well, pretty much _anybody_ would be better than Jackass Dickemmore. A single-celled organism would be better, but I digress. You’re strong, and not just in the Lycan ‘ _grrr!’_ type, but I mean, emotionally and shit.”

“’Emotionally and shit’?” Scott quirked a brow, unimpressed.

“Ya-huh. And you’re dependable, and more intelligent than you let on, and fiercely loyal. You’re level-headed when you need to be, and most importantly, you have a really fucking amazing AI partner who tells you what to do in a scrape.”

“Yeah, that’s definitely a plus,” the Naut replied, but his grin was sincere, and anyone would have to be blind not to see the devotion between the two.

“And at this rate, who knows? You might be promoted to platoon leader next, and who knows? Maybe lieutenant someday!”

“Noooo!” Scott whined as he shoved the jacket away and pulled a pillow over his head.

“A general! A field marshal!” Stiles crowed gleefully, obviously relishing his partner’s distress. “The next Commander-in-Chief! Working right under Commander Argent! _Think of all that wonderful responsibility!_ The heated glares and loaded looks!”

 

 

“We are so, so, _so fucked._ ”

Explosions and rapid fire were surrounding them in all sides. Scott was hunched behind a rocky outcropping, debris and dust showering around him. There were fifty or so Vu firing at them from the burnt-out husk of a hijacked carrier. Scott’s team crouched low on the other side of the ship, out of sight from the Vu, awaiting the signal from their leader to mount the assault.

“Captain! Line abreast?” came the comm from Chen through the fuzzy crackle of his damaged helmet.

“Stiles, how’s the mic output?”

“It’s in pieces, that’s how it is,” Stiles’ voice came out hard. “The shrapnel’s completely destroyed the wiring of the mic on the right side of your helmet – you’ve got no outgoing sound whatsoever.”

“Terrain?”

“Scanning – topographical data shows the landscape is smooth enough for a frontal assault, but Kirsanov and Belmonte both have leg wounds. The rest are alright, though.”

“Okay, good to know. Take a dictation note. Put Chen at the front, drive the Vu back with a reinforced line and put Kirsanov and Belmonte on the wings to avoid engagement. Wedge formation so the wings prevent outflanking. Any counterattack those bastards try will be met with a counter counterattack. Let’s drive these Vu towards the wall and smite the shit out of them. Patch me through to Chen via visual, then. Front camera.”

The video footage replayed before sending it was grainy, but serviceable. Scott’s stiff fingers gestured the standardised hand signals for close range engagement, first the number of Vu (his fingers spread wide as a five, then fingers curled into a circle, fingertips meeting thumb, for a zero) and then his instructions, a fist swung downwards for wedge formation, the flat of his hand against his eyes  to wait for his signal.

The fire died down temporarily, the Vu reloading their weapons and obviously fooled by Stiles’ clever plot to activate the motion sensors around their hiding area to make it seem that there were far, far more of them than just one Naut and his smart-assed AI calling the shots. It was a risky plan, but the Vu were more volatile than usual, and had to be dealt with swiftly.

“Right, well, Chen’s received the missive and video, and Adele’s sent back the ten-four. We have about an eight minute and thirty-two second window before everything goes to hell for us to make the distraction, fire the flare and then get to that slate ledge a few hundred feet to our left, about four o’clock. Chen’s going to mount the assault and, worse comes to worse, detonate the explosive to take out the rest of that carrier, blast ‘em into the open.”

“Sounds like a plan, dude. We ready to rock?” Scott grinned, somewhat feral, while the intro chords in the background music were already playing through the (mostly working) speakers.

“Back in the ring to take another swing, buddy,” Stiles cheered as the drums started up, [ _You Shook Me All Night Long_](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lo2qQmj0_h4) swinging into gear, volume rising. With a barked laugh, Scott tipped his head back and howled gleefully, letting his fangs drop and his form shift into Beta, claws pricking the neoprene of his gloves.

“ _Let’s shake ‘em!_ ” he yelled, bolstered by Stiles’ near-manic whoop as he pushed off the rock face, flare gun gripped tight in one hand, ray-emission pistol in the other.

 

 

“You ever think about getting an android body?”

“Sometimes,” Stiles replied, watching Scott shovel pasta bake into his mouth at an alarming speed. His face was a little older, wiser, even as he retained his youthful vibrancy and enthusiasm. “I’ve never heard of the military AIs getting them, though.”

“Why not?” Scott queried through a mouthful of cheese and macaroni.

“I’m not sure. To be honest, I never really looked into it. All the AIs I know who have humanoid shells are the standard regulation ones. Maybe military AIs feel too constricted in a human skin. We do a lot more processing than the standard ones.”

“You could always research it some. I mean, time’s ticking. I’ve only got a year left of duty before I retire.”

“Somehow, the thought of a human body doesn’t really do things to me,” Stiles admitted, face screwed up comically as Scott continued his gross food consumption. He nodded with a smile at Allison, who brought her tray over and sat down beside Scott, giving the Naut a peck on the cheek. “I mean – yeah, sometimes the notion of food sounds pretty good-”

“You should try my triple-chocolate brownies, Stiles, they’re worth saddling yourself with humanity for,” Allison chimed in, earning another sickly, simpering look from her beloved.

“Touch is pretty good,” Scott added, “Being able to hug people. Cuddling is rad.” He abandoned his macaroni in favour of wrapping Allison up in his arms, nuzzling her face with his nose.

“Don’t forget kissing,” Allison supplemented, “And sex. Sex is definitely great.”

“Oh yeah, sex is the _bomb_.”

“Yeah, see, I find it a little difficult to believe how trading bodily fluids can be anything except nauseating,” Stiles commented, looking sceptical. “And the whole idea of _defecation_. Ugh.”

“Man, nothing better than having a really good poop,” Scott mused, seeming not at all sorry for sharing his unwelcome pearl of wisdom.

“I think looking into an android body would be a good thing to do, and soon, too,” Allison went on, half-elbowing Scott’s octopus-like grip off of her playfully. “Scott only has about a year of service left, and then he’s retiring.”

“Dude, as easy as it is to cart you around in the ChipGuard, not to mention cutting the laundry, groceries and utilities by half, I don’t think Beacon Hills is equipped with enough technology to keep an AI in perfect running order, not to mention fully-charged.”

“Android bodies _do_ save a phenomenal amount of power once started up,” came Allison’s reasoning (again) as she picked up Scott’s abandoned utensil and took a dainty forkful of his forgotten pasta.

"I know how marvellous AI microchips are on their own, but just imagine the sheer amount of freedom that having complete autonomy of your body could give you."  
  
"Yeah, no more having to make small-talk with Scott after too many bean-burritos while he's on the crapper," Stiles considered.  
  
"Dude, that was like only twice, okay, and until you have your own set of bowels and bowel-movements, I don't think you can judge me for prioritising my butt's relief over unstrapping my ChipGuard."  
  
"It's still a traumatising experience, Scott," Stiles argued back good-naturedly.  
  
"And besides, who else is going to give the best man's speech at the wedding?"  
  
"That's right, Stiles," his best friend shot back, "It won't be the same without you having an actual body to hold the champagne flute with."  
  
"I suppose that's a valid reason to look into it," the AI mumbled fondly, grinning dopily. "I'll start my research soon, then."

 

 

Scott was sitting on the edge of a hard, plastic bench in an ARGUS corridor, hands clasped tightly under his chin, elbows propped up on his kneecaps. Allison sat beside him, looking hopeless as she rubbed his back, trying desperately to give the Naut a modicum of comfort.  

"Maybe it's not that bad, Scott," she encouraged, rubbing his arm in a placating manner. "Maybe Stiles just contracted a minor virus, or some of the wiring in the chip came loose."  
  
"It's been... happening for a while," Scott admitted, mouth turned down unhappily as he stared at his clasped hands. "I thought maybe it might have been something small. It started just after Operation Theta, so I thought that maybe Stiles had worn himself out, jacking all those ports and hacking through all those security barriers. Like... his batteries were really low after it, probably the lowest they'd been the entire time we'd been partners. So he got charged again but... he was different."  
  
"I hadn't noticed," Allison admitted, looking abashed.  
  
"It wasn't a huge difference, but after knowing him for so long, I could tell." He spread his hands out in a helpless gesture. "He was getting more talkative, which isn’t really strange of him, but he couldn’t seem to focus on one thing. And I mean, Stiles, he _prides_ himself on getting a job done perfectly. He’s a massive stickler for faultlessness, but he just couldn’t seem to get his head in the game properly.”

“That doesn’t sound like him at all.”

“I _know_!” He thumped his closed fist on his knee, while his other hand crumpled the uniform trousers. “And then… he was worrying about me, which is awesome and great and fine because we’re bros, we look out for each other, but during Theta he kept trying to sabotage the mission to get me out of there without a scratch. And I mean, I know I got away with just a minor wrist fracture, but he was freaking out, like I’d gotten my entire arm blasted off. And then…” He took a shuddering breath, lifting his eyes to meet Allison’s, wet and wide and full of concern, “His hologram-”

“What about his hologram?” she asked, gripping his shoulders tight, equally as distressed.

“It – his hologram – it kept flickering on and off. Like a badly-tuned television, except without static, he just disappeared. And once, I saw it turn red. I thought it was just a trick of the light, but,” he clasped his hands together again, stared down at the floor, “The second time it happened, I couldn’t ignore it anymore. I had to bring him down to the lab to make sure he was okay.”

They sat in silence for a long moment, neither of them talking. Allison had her hands folded in her lap, sitting close enough so that her side was touching Scott’s, offering him the comfort of a nearby presence.

“Alli,” he whispered, eyes closed and face a mask of pain, “He couldn’t remember the date we’d set for the wedding.”

Allison raised a shaking hand to cover her mouth, and the two continued to sit in anxious stillness, awaiting the news from inside the sterile room.

 

 

“What the fuck do you _mean_ , he’s finished?” he snarled, slamming his palms against the table. Doctor Mahealani simply stood on the other side of the desk, Stiles’ chip on the surface between them. The microprocessor was plugged into a flat, strange-looking device, with wires coming out of the side ports. Stiles’ hologram was on, but it was fuzzy and dim.

“McCall, you need to understand, Stiles has been operational for almost eight years.” His tone was patient and understanding, but it didn’t seem to be having a calming effect on Scott at all. “It’s a normal thing for military-standard AIs to begin deteriorating into their degenerated, Overclocked state. Even periods of recuperation can’t forestall it – it’s inevitable.”

“So you’re telling me that Stiles is just gonna die, then?” Scott growled, nails elongating into claws, struggling with his emotions enough to let the control of his shift slide.

“Stiles was never really alive to begin with,” Mahealani murmured, his expression saddened.

“That’s bullshit. That’s complete and utter _fucking bullshit_ ,” the Naut spat. He gestured angrily at Stiles, who had his head bowed and his eyes fixed on the table top, his outline fuzzy. “Stiles is more human than anybody I know! He’s – he’s grown so much, even without a physical body, he’s _still human_! He’s _alive_!”

“Not f-r much lo-er, Scotty -oy,” Stiles said, his voice soft and cracking on the last syllable, a harsh static marring the words. And, just like that, all the fight seemed to drain out of Scott instantaneously. “I never thought to ask about what happened to the other AIs,” he continued, his speech function wavering, “Not once in the years we’ve been together. I just assumed that we’d retire together or something.” He laughed, a little watery noise, wrapping his arms around himself. “I guess that, in this instance, assuming made an ass out of you and me.”

“This can’t be the end of it,” Scott implored, raising begging eyes to the young doctor. “Stiles… he’s supposed to be the best man at my wedding and make an awful, cheesy toast at the reception. He’s supposed to get an android body and find out what it’s like to eat my mom’s cooking, and poop.” He choked, tears already trailing down his cheeks. “He can’t die. He’s my best friend…” he whispered.

“I wish – I could do something, McCall,” Doctor Mahealani murmured. “Stiles - Sławomierz Czibor Stilinski, he was the first AI I ever created.” He touched the port of the device gently with his fingertips. “As Stiles’ creator, I feel a certain – connection, if you will, with him. He was my pride and joy – he’s unlike any other AI I have created since, a true one-of-a-kind, with more technological know-how packed into his tiny mainframe than any other.” Mahealani sighed, and fixed Scott with a truly regretful look. “I wish it wasn’t so, McCall. Truly, I wish Stiles could be spared from Overclocking, live on as a regular AI in an android suit, live out his days in retirement with you. But as you can see,” he indicated to the hologram, which was, even at that very moment, flickering and buzzing in and out of form, “He hasn’t much time left. It’s only with the hardware connected to a specialised turbine that he’s even operational now.”

“Don’t make me say goodbye to him,” Scott pleased, “Not like this. Not now.”

“If you care for him like a human, like your best friend, you would, and you would allow me to deactivate him afterwards. It’s the most humane thing for him,” Mahealani explained gently. “If he were to continue, he would literally think himself to death. He would short-circuit himself, would go the equivalent of mad, pulled in a thousand directions at once. He would forget everything, including you.”

“-is the b-st way to go, S-ott,” Stiles grated out, barely comprehensible.

“I can’t let you go, Stiles,” Scott sobbed openly now, his face a wet mess of tears. “I’ll – I’m going to miss you too much. I can’t just – _leave_ you to die. I can’t. I –”

“- miss y-u too,” Stiles croaked, lopsided smile on his tiny face that didn’t quite work. “-ank you . F-r everyt-g. Y-ve been the b-st – friend. T-ank you.”

“G’bye buddy,” Scott whimpered, his hands obviously eager to reach out and hold his friend, for the first and final time, yet holding himself back from the futility of trying to touch something immaterial. The metal desk dented beneath his fingertips.

Doctor Mahealani waited a moment, and then flicked a switch on the port. Stiles’ holographic image, now devoid of external power, flickered weaker and dimmer than ever. The AI gave his Naut one last, watery smile, and a brief wave of his hand.

And then, abruptly, his figure blipped out of existence altogether.

A great, wracking sob wrenched from his chest, and he crumpled to the ground, an anguished howl tearing free from his throat.

 

 

“Just because you’ve inherited the position as head of the AI program off that dickweed Harris, it doesn’t mean that you can play Frankenstein or God with the AIs,” Mahealani’s assistant, Mehra, said, scribbling figures furiously onto a clipboard.

“I wouldn’t exactly call it ‘playing God’ if I’m just trying to fix some malfunctioning, long-dead equipment,” Danny spoke, sounding slightly exasperated. “Harris was brilliant, but he was also reluctant to take risks, or try more unorthodox methods.”

“So exactly what are you hoping to do with this AI if it works?” his lab assistant asked, glancing up from his paperwork curiously, peering over the rim of his spectacles.

“This particular model has been decommissioned for almost two years now. The department’s made enough technological advances in that time for me to try and revive Overclocked units.” He typed up some commands on the screen and set the machine running, feeding external power to a data board on the table beside him. “The unit’s been through an intense data recovery program in the last few months. I’m hoping that, if this works, it can be reactivated for use in the field, hopefully in a fully-stabilised form. I’m curious to see how, if successfully recovered from Overclocked status, a reactivated AI can function in a live combat scenario.”

“And I suppose that the possibility of recycling Overclocked AIs has pretty good appeal, considering how much money ARGUS pumps into creating them in the first place.”

“Naturally.”

“One problem, though,” the young tech brought up. “If the AI _can_ be revived from Overclocked status, what’s stopping it from revealing their previous condition to their Naut partner? It could spook them into not wanting to work with the AI altogether.”

“I’ve already thought of that,” Danny replied. “Within the coding of the AI, I’ve included a safety command-blanket. Basically, the AI won’t be able to access the last few months of service, which is when their Overclocked symptoms first began manifesting. Unless specifically ordered by using a manual override, the probability of which in a regular reconnaissance mission is almost nil, the AI won’t even be aware of what’s happening to it. Heck, it won’t even be aware that the mission I’ve planned for it is nothing more than a trial-run to see if it’ll actually work. As far as it knows, it’s simply been turned off for twenty months and inactive ever since his old Naut partner retired, if somewhat abruptly. I’ll see how it fares as a test subject first, and then I may return its memories, as long as they don’t prove detrimental to the AI, its partner or the mission in any way.”

“Do you have anyone in mind to partner your hopefully-recovered AI?”

“I’ve got a few Nauts in mind. A couple of them are newbies, so they shouldn’t notice a difference, but I was hoping to perhaps partner him with a more experienced Naut, if only for the fact that Nauts that have been in service longer actually have the ability to go out on missions. A perfect testing environment for a recovered unit. One of the Nauts on the force is known for his ability to execute tasks even without AI guidance, so he’s a possibility. Of course, it’ll depend on whether or not he agrees to it.”

“And if he doesn’t?” Mehra tapped the end of the ballpoint against the clipboard.

“I’ll find another test Naut for my subject,” Danny shrugged. “Easy as that.”

“You worried about anything?”

“Maybe,” Danny replied, pausing in his typing, considering. “Maybe the AI will remember things over time. Maybe it’ll boot up again for a short period of time, but then revert back into Overclocked status. Or perhaps it just won’t work at all. Only one way to find out.”

He typed a few more coding commands, and then hovered his finger over the _ENTER_ key. “Moment of truth,” he said, nodding to Mehra as he decisively pressed the input. The external power hummed to life, almost imperceptibly. Nothing seemed to happen for a minute or two, until the microchip flickered to life slowly, the circular heart of the chip shining its round, central light. Agonisingly slowly, the faint halogen light spread upwards, and a miniature figure gradually materialised into existence.

“Hello, Stiles,” Danny Mahealani smiled, his expression satisfied.


	7. Chapter 7

The video minimised and switched off altogether, the surface of the chip empty for the briefest moment before Stiles’ holographic projection flickered back into existence. Had Derek enough presence of mind to pay attention to smaller detail, he would have been gratified to see Stiles’ expression match his own incredulous one. As it was, however, he couldn’t focus on much of anything, save for the deep, echoing silence in the tiny, dingy room they’d barricaded themselves into, and the roaring of blood in his head.

The videos – most of them had been from Stiles’ point of view, but some had been compiled from security footage and cameras around ARGUS that had captured the moments that Stiles hadn't. Obviously, they’d been edited and cobbled together to form the detailed collage that made Stiles’ backstory, and rather thoroughly, too. But at that moment, Derek wished more than anything that he hadn't inputted the manual command, forced Stiles to reveal everything he had. It was a long time before either of them said anything, the pause pregnant and uncomfortable in the air.

“Are you –” his voice caught in his throat, and his stomach roiled, churning with bile and the heavy knowledge that he’d suddenly had saddled on his shoulders. Stiles’ gaze was rooted to his diaphanous feet, shame colouring each atom of his being. Somehow, Derek managed to swallow the golf-sized lump that had lodged itself behind his tongue. “Did you know about this?”

Stiles said nothing, prompting a surge of anger inside Derek that made repressing the urge to throw something, break something, almost impossible. He needed to be quiet – _they_ needed to be as quiet as possible, to stay out of sight and earshot of the Vu, now alerted to their presence in the station. He clenched his fist against his knee, a barely-audible growl rumbling from deep inside his chest, stemming from the Lycan side of him that felt wounded, betrayed. “Stiles, answer me,” he growled, hardly able to contain his rage.

“I knew,” the AI whispered, his words shamefully, pathetically small, too burdened with sadness for someone so usually overflowing with vibrancy. “I – nobody told me, but I figured it out on my own, that I might have been… _Overclocked_.” He stuttered on the final word, as if the non-existent breath through his imitation body truly did catch in his throat. “I never asked, not Danny, but somehow I knew that the pieces didn’t fit right. I had too much data from other missions, too many memories of Scott and Allison and everybody else. It seemed too strange that Scott would leave without telling me. But,” he said, finally raising his eyes to meet Derek’s, imploring to be believed, “large portions of my memory had been blanked out, and I hadn't known for sure.”

“But now somehow you magically do?” Derek scoffed, scepticism colouring his every word.

“The video footage files had been arranged in chronological order from Doctor Mahealani as part of his records, and they’d been stored in an encrypted folder out of my main search functions. The video files were so well hidden that, unless prompted, I wouldn’t have gone looking for them, because I honestly wouldn’t have known they were even there to begin with.” He balled his tiny hands into fists, and then relaxed his fingers open, only to wring them together helplessly a moment later. “Derek – I didn’t know for sure, and I swear, I didn’t know anything about this mission.”

“You mean this _farce_ of an assignment, this completely _pointless_ waste of time, which has landed both of us into more trouble than we could have imagined,” Derek snapped viciously, edging away from the chip as if the sheer presence of it disgusted him. He knew it was a catty way to behave, but at that moment, he couldn’t care less. “How do I even know for certain that you _didn’t_ know about this useless piece of shit assignment? How do I know that Mahealani didn’t fill you in on the details of it, and you just came along for the ride because you wanted to find out if you still worked or not?”

“I would have told you if I’d known!” Stiles exclaimed, the pitch of his voice higher, distressed. His holographic image blinked red for a moment, then fuzzed below the knee, like badly-tuned static. “Derek, I wouldn’t have sat back and not done anything if I’d known that it was all for nothing!”

“But I don’t know for sure,” he sneered back, completely lost to his own anger. “There’s no information port to find, _nothing_. And now we’re stuck in an empty storage vent, hiding from Vu armed to the teeth with weapons, because you hid information from me.”

“Derek-”

“I _trusted you_ ,” he snarled, too hurt to make heads or tails of anything anymore. “You knew something was wrong and you never bothered to see exactly what it was, because you’d rather follow the orders of some higher-up commanding _asshole_ than your own partner. There’s god-knows-how many Vu out there trying to hunt us down, and the only way I got the whole story was by _forcing it out of you_.” He was riling himself up into a righteous, frothing anger, dimly aware that at least the helmet’s muting padding was still effective, because otherwise the enemy would be able to hear every word of his vitriol.

“And _I_ trusted _you_ , Derek!” Stiles snapped back, his voice venomous with fury, even as the projection of his face showed hurt. “You said that you wouldn’t use the override command on me anymore. You _knew_ how much I hated it, how much _all_ AIs hate that stupid command, those handful of words that completely strip us of any autonomy and independence over ourselves and turn us into little more than calculators with a servitude complex. You _knew_!” His fists clenched against his sides, and the neuron pathways on his body flittered ferociously in the low light of the vent, as though his anger was enough to physically alter his projected form. “And yet, you did it anyway. Why would you _do_ something like that?”

“Because I fucking _care_ about you, you little dipshit!” Derek shouted back, no longer having any control on his rage. “I had to sit here and watch your records and log tapes and fucking _hallway security footage_ to find out that you’re literally living on borrowed time! What am I supposed to think, that now you’re going to stop functioning altogether, stutter to a stop and just _die_?”

Stiles’ form seemed to wilt. “You heard what Doctor Mahealani said on the security tape. I was never really alive to begin with. I’m just a simulacrum of a living person.”

“That’s bullshit, and you know it,” Derek spat. “You’re more expressive than anybody I know.” He huffed out an angry breath and massaged his left bicep with his other hand. It was still feeling stiff from the shot, and probably wouldn’t feel right again for a few more hours. “Our main objective has changed. We’re getting out of here.”

Stiles blinked, looking eager to help. “Do you want me to compute a-”

“Calculate the most direct pathway back to the ship, trying to avoid contact with the enemy,” Derek said succinctly, standing up and stretching his knees. “Upload the route on the helmet screen. We’re heading back to the ship and back to ARGUS.” He picked up his discarded rifle and wound the strap around his shoulder, keeping it in the ready position, feeling dread in his stomach that he’d probably be using it, and soon.

“What about-” Stiles began, looking up at him from where his chip sat on the upended crate. Impatiently, Derek snatched up the chip and slid it back into the slot in the breastplate of his suit, essentially ignoring Stiles’ words as his body blinked out.

“Derek – do you want me to-”

“Just upload the route on the helmet screen, Stiles,” Derek said edgily, making a show of checking over his gloves and his gun, not feeling in charge of his emotions enough to control his words. The AI was quiet for a long, long moment, and then a floor plan of Zeta base scrolled into the periphery vision on the side of the helmet’s diode display, directly underneath Stiles’ _ACTIVE_ button. As if he needed reminding of the direness of the situation, Derek’s eyes were immediately drawn to it, watching for a moment as it flickered just a touch – enough for it to wedge another lump in his throat.

“Vocal Command 6, AI power options, AI functions reduced to Battery Saving mode,” he muttered out loud, an infinitesimal part of him glad that, even with Stiles’ Overclocking, the command still executed. Programs and windows on the inside of his helmet diode that weren’t absolutely vital to his former command were switched off altogether, leaving him with only the map, Stiles’ display and his suit’s statistics up on the screen.

“Derek-” Stiles’ voice came through the earpiece, small and worried. Derek shook off the guilt that had been clawing at him, choosing instead to heft the pistol higher in his grip. He had to get them out of Zeta Base and back to ARGUS, as soon as humanly possible. He _had_ to get Stiles back to the lab before it was too late. Mahealani had fixed Stiles once; he could do it again, before it was too late. Derek had enough practice interrogating foreign spies to know that he could be extremely convincing when he tried, especially if he shifted his canines just enough.

He’d get them back to ARGUS. He’d stake his life on it.

 

 

Despite the straightforward route mapped out, getting out of Zeta Base proved more difficult than Derek had anticipated. Now that the Vu were on high alert for an intruder, especially a hostile one with weapons, the entire structure seemed to be crawling with them. He could barely make it a few yards here or there without his proximity sensors lighting up. And Derek was finding this more difficult than he’d ever anticipated. Because of his Lycan background, his training had equipped him for take-down scenarios, brute feats of strength only multiplied by his Beta transformation. Stealth missions like these weren’t his forte, especially unassisted. His base instincts could keep him noiseless, render him light on his feet and fast, but his impatience always got the best of him. That was what an AI was for, guiding him through the processes.

That’s what Stiles was for.

But Derek couldn’t trust him, could he? Even as he’d edged his way through corridors and pointedly ignored Stiles, it had taken him three times longer than normal to get from one section to another. Even with the IDB still at half capacity, he wouldn’t last at this glacial pace. His Lycan ability could only bolster him so much before exhaustion, hunger and thirst overtook him, and even having passed out for that little while hadn't helped – an hour didn’t make much of a difference when faced with such a taxing assignment.

Laura always said he was too stubborn for his own good. If both of them had any chance of getting out of Zeta, and in one piece, he’d have to consult Stiles. The Primary Life-Support Subsystem could only keep him alive for so long. At least their ship had a secondary oxygen supply, and fresher supplies of food and water. Not to mention the route back to ARGUS had already been pre-programmed, so Stiles wouldn’t be using his battery power to steer them.

“AI battery check,” he muttered, hunkered awkwardly behind a set of cooler pipes. A Vu had just lumbered past, and Derek had evaded being seen just in time. He couldn’t handle this for much longer.

“Battery at fifty-four percent, estimated –attery life one-hundred and eighty-two point five-two hours remaining,” Stiles dutifully answered, if without his usual chipper tone.

“How is it possible that your battery has come down so much?” Derek demanded, shocked. Last time he’d asked, the battery had been almost thirty percent higher. He doggedly ignored the blip in Stiles’ voice during the statement.

“Despite AI batteries having long lives, they’re not unlimited, and the process of Overclocking can aid in significant deterioration. The gradual degradation of the cathode is accelerated with the repeated subtraction and addition of ions that alters the structure of the lithium material,” Stiles babbled, his pace feverish. “Additionally, the electrolytes in the battery are prone to decomposing, oxidising the cathode receptors, which Overclocking increases with rapidness.”

“Common shorthand,” Derek sighed, feeling overwhelmed at the technological jargon.

“Overclocking not only alters the information capacity of the AI program itself, but promotes corrosion at an excessive pace on the surface of the chip itself,” Stiles answered.

“Can an AI unit be fitted with a new chip?” he asked, panicking. Not only was Stiles’ psyche dying, but now his chip was, too?

“It has been known to occur when damaged during missions,” Stiles replied.

Derek massaged his stiff bicep, warring internally with himself. On one hand, taking Stiles out of Battery Saving mode would mean his battery life depleting severely, at an increased rate. But on the other hand, it would mean that they’d get out of Zeta Base faster, and be back at ARGUS sooner. He didn’t know what happened to AIs once their battery ran out – he’d never heard of it happening on missions, not with their considerable battery life, especially on a unit that was experiencing Overclocking. Would Stiles be able to reboot if he went out? Or would his Overclocked system not allow him to? Derek would just have to take that chance and hope for the best, that Stiles could hold on until then. Their ship didn’t have a portable power outlet to recharge an AI chip, but maybe if he took apart one of the smaller consoles, he could hook Stiles into it to stop him from running out of battery altogether.

“Vocal command 6, AI functions upgraded to Balanced mode,” he spoke, hoping that, at least, Balanced mode would balance Stiles’ performance with his energy consumption and give them that little bit longer. “Stiles – we have to get back to the ship as fast as possible while avoiding conflict with the Vu. Do you think you can handle processing an escape route?”

“Do you trust me enough to?” Stiles’ voice asked, scepticism making his words uncertain.

“I trust you,” Derek replied immediately, not even having to think about it. “I’m not going to lie, I feel really fucking shitty about this entire situation-”

“You and me both,” Stiles muttered.

“- _but_ I think that, if both of us are going to get out of here alive, we’re going to have to trust one another unequivocally. No more secrets between us. You tell me everything that’s going through your mind, and I do the same.”

“No more lone-wolf persona for either of us, then?” Stiles joked. Derek could hear the worry in his voice, the careful wording, and hated that Stiles was censoring himself now, something he’d never done before.

“No more lone-wolf,” he agreed. Their apologies to one another went unspoken, but somehow Derek felt that they both got it, loud and clear. He allowed himself a small smile, the first he’d had in what felt like an eternity. “Let’s get out of here and go home.”

 

 

Because of the sudden Vu activity, a lot of the previously opened doors had been shut, and many of their prior routes were patrolled. Derek was guided through a lot of narrow passageways, squeezing uncomfortably between tiny service corridors and crawling, once again, in air ducts. A few times, their route had them doubling back, effectively wasting even more time, but it was done out of necessity for avoiding conflict.

Stiles was, for the most part, as attentive and useful as before, with the exception of his voice. He kept quiet when necessary, but when he spoke, his speech was significantly faster than normal, and he was prone to rambling off onto unrelated tangents, an obvious symptom of his thought processors racing faster than ever in his degenerating state. Derek , on more than one occasion, was forced to talk Stiles through a particularly odd set of instructions to ensure that their new objective (exiting Zeta Base) was not clashing with Stiles’ sudden and prime objective to keep Derek safe at all costs. A few times, Stiles had rerouted them simply because he didn’t agree with the statistics of a certain situation, like how it was 0.5% feasible that the set of cooling pipes that Derek had to squeeze under to access the service shaft could break and crush him under the weight. Derek just had to take that chance, and Stiles, for all his worrying, hadn't steered him wrong yet. At the pace they were travelling, they could probably exit the base in between three to four hours. He felt the glimmer of hope swell that they would somehow make it out alive.

That was to say, he felt it until the moment he plugged Stiles into one of the circuit boards to override the entry code and open one of the doors. None of the proximity alarms suggested a Vu anywhere nearby, but they still had to hurry, just in case. Where the door panel was situated didn’t leave much hiding space around it to duck out of sight quickly.

“Derek,” Stiles spoke, his body visible as he combed the terminal for the right keygen, “according to my data, there’s a bunch of Vu close to the centre of the base that have sequestered themselves in one of the larger assembly rooms. Those rooms are equipped with emergency lock-out features. If I can access the coding by tapping into the mainframe through one of these ports, I could activate the safety lock and shut them in.”

“There’ll still be Vu patrolling around, though, won’t there?” Derek asked, looking down at Stiles’ iridescent body. The polychromatic lines of circuitry were shimmering as brightly as usual when he was running a program, but there seemed to be something desperate in his voice, an eagerness to do something helpful. Derek, being no stranger to dangerous situations, had heard that attitude many times before – hell, he’d been guilty of it himself. It was the tone of someone eager, desperate to do something, anything, to redeem themselves in someone’s eyes. Which, as noble as it sounded, also unfortunately tended to make people do stupid things. Stiles wasn’t a person, but his Overclocked state could compromise the rationality of his decisions.

“There’ll still be Vu, yes,” Stiles answered, just as the key activated and the door hissed open. “It won’t stop all of them, but it’ll give us enough of a distraction to buy us more time. The problem is that it’ll raise their awareness, and prompt hysteria in the ones that are looking for us.”

“So on one hand, we can continue to try sneaking out of here, or on the other we can definitely trap some of them, but increase our chances of being found by the remaining Vu who are looking for us,” Derek clarified.

“I can do it,” Stiles said quickly, turning back to the power board and extending his hands outwards, his circuitry, then faded back to a normal blue after the door had opened, flaring to life again. “It’s no problem for my battery. If anything, my Overclocked status is helping because it means I can process the information faster than before. Not by much, you see, because I was already pretty advanced, but even those few milliseconds are worth something when-”

“Stiles, wait!” Derek hissed, as the diode screen flickered to life and the numbers and graphics whirred past, too fast to see even with his Lycan eyes. “Won’t this alert them of our whereabouts?”

“Only if I trip the alarm,” Stiles replied, feverishly ticking through the data. “Although I could always set them off just to cause confusion. There’d be sirens and lights and maybe in the commotion we can run out.”

“Oh maybe we’d run straight into a bewildered Vu who’s freaking out at the _loud alarms going off_ and they’d fire a plasma shot right through my chest,” Derek argued. Then, in a softer tone, “Stiles, I know you’re focusing on my safety, but you need to focus on yours, too. If your battery fries before we get out of here, I’d be stranded without a map to get out.” He knew enough of the basic plans of bases to make his own way out, but it was obvious that Stiles wasn’t thinking as logically as usual. Perhaps he figured he could sway him with guilt. “I’d have no proximity sensors without you, no way to know if I’d run into a Vu or not. Pull out of the mainframe and let’s keep going. _Please_.”

He didn’t know if it was the word ‘please’ that had done it – Derek couldn’t think of a time where he’d actually used the word without an underlying sarcastic vein. But the screen suddenly went black, and Stiles pulled his hands away, flinching as if he’d been burned.

“What did I do?” he whispered, horrified.

“Nothing. Stiles, you didn’t do anything yet. You just opened the door, that’s all.”

“I almost – Derek, I _almost_ – fuck.” His tiny hands went into fists, body shaking at the realisation. He looked broken, devastated. “It was almost too late. I just – it doesn’t even make sense, not when I run the decision through my scanners, it doesn’t make any _logical sense_. What the fuck was I about to do?”

“You stopped it,” Derek urged. “You stopped yourself just in time. Stiles, you’re Overclocking, but you’re still trying your best, I know it.”

“Put me back into the suit, before the volume of my voice attracts anybody else in the area,” Stiles said, voice shaky. “At least inside, the mute functions on your suit will still let us talk without anybody hearing us.”

Derek hurried to comply, trying to be as gentle with the microprocessor as possible while he unplugged it from the server, even as his neoprene gloves made his already large fingers feel even more graceless and clumsy than usual. The chip slides back into his suit with a satisfying click, and the uneasy prickle that he’d felt the moment Stiles had left his suit lifted from his shoulders.

“You have to get out of here, Derek,” the AI urged, his voice distraught. “What I was doing, it was beyond – if I ever do something like that again, if I even start, you should deactivate me for good.”

“ _Stiles!_ ”

“It’s for your own good!” he cried. “And if you don’t, then I’ll do it myself. I can’t put you in danger with my stupidity, Derek, I _won’t._ ”

Derek didn’t want to think about it. As far as he was concerned, it wasn’t even an option. He cared about what was happening to Stiles, probably more than he should, but he couldn’t possibly stand to hear those words and remember Stiles’ flickering projection just moments prior, looking overwhelmed.

“We’re not talking about this anymore. That’s final,” he snapped.

 

 

If Derek had thought that talks of deactivation were over, he was obviously just fooling himself. Crawling through another goddamned vent, Stiles broached the topic again, despite Derek’s insistent refusal to even listen.

“You could use me as a decoy,” Stiles was saying, “Like in the mission you saw with me and Scott, how we’d activated the motion sensors around to fool them into thinking there are more of us.”

“I’m not leaving you behind, you idiot,” Derek grunted, pulling himself through the claustrophobic vent as quickly as possible, trying to stay silent. It was slow work. God, he fucking _hated_ vents. After this, he was fucking retiring. “Now drop it.”

“If you leave me plugged into one of the modems, I can create noise diversions away from you, give you enough time to make a run for it and get back to the ship, back to ARGUS.”

“I said. Drop. It.” He gritted his teeth angrily, trying to mentally push himself through a leg cramp.

“I know about your feelings,” Stiles said quickly, his voice louder, shocking Derek into stillness. “They’re – your feelings, they’re like Scott’s. You think I’m human. You think I’m your friend.”

“You _are_ ,” the Naut insisted, only coming to the startling realisation himself in that very second. Stiles wasn’t just his comrade, he was his _friend_. Derek didn’t have too many of those, but faced with the very real possibility that he could be losing Stiles, everything seemed to be pulling together into one solid idea, one long, endless stream on _nononononoNO_.

“Derek. It’s nobody’s fault, least of all yours,” Stiles murmured, words soft and lacking their usual witty banter, their usual spark. “When you look at me, you see Stiles, you see me as a person, a free-thinking organism. But it’s not real. You’re not really seeing anything except a holographic image projected on a data chip. I’m not real. I’m a result of science and nano-assemblage. Fuck, I’m not even corporeal, just data and lights – I can’t move around on my own, I’m confined to the boundaries of the projection board. But – god, if I could…”

“Stiles?” he whispered, feeling awful at how Stiles was always telling him to use his words, that the first fucking time they’re having _proper_ _words_ about this was on the tail end of a mission, Vu breathing down their necks and trying to shoot them into oblivion, and Derek wedged awkwardly in an army crawl inside an air vent.

“Derek, if I could, I’d try so hard to be real, if it’d make you happy. I couldn’t do it for Scott in time, I didn’t think my time with him would be over so soon. My time with _you_. And now all I can think of is desperately trying to get you out of this hell-hole and back to ARGUS, because I’m replaceable, Derek, but you – you _aren’t._ ”

“Nobody could replace you,” he snapped back, more viciously than he’d intended, because damn it all to hell, he was fucking _scared_ for Stiles. He resumed his crawl, now a little faster, gritting his teeth through the exhaustion and the pain because they needed to get out _together_. “They couldn’t possibly hope to recreate an AI as ridiculously frustrating as you.”

“You know I’m going to be terminated, one way or another,” Stiles continued, side-stepping the obvious diversion. “Whether it be on my own, or simply by time running out and my microprocessor eradicating by wear through battery ports. Or it could be something as simple as my peers deactivating me back in the lab like they did last time I Overclocked. It’s something inescapable, unavoidable.”

“Shut up,” he growled, determinedly not paying attention to the sting in his eyes.

“But it’ll be alright in the end, Derek, you know? There are other units out there, and even if they’re not broken and frayed and dysfunctional like me, they’ll still have some small part of me in them.”

“I won’t let you fucking give up, not _now_ , not when we’re so close to getting back to the ship,” Derek gasped, scrabbling with his hand as the hold on his last shuffle slipped, sending him sprawling. According to the map on the inside of his helmet, they were less than an hour from the exit, they were _close_. “You can’t give up, you were always telling me giving up was for wimpy losers.”

“That I did,” Stiles chuckled wetly, “But there’s a difference between giving up and accepting the inevitable. Even if I Overclock, or… I suppose you could use the term ‘die’ – even if I ‘die’, a part of me will always live on, even if it’s it a test tube, or a digital disk. I know none of them will have my amazing qualities, or my rapier-like wit,” he snorted, self-deprecatingly. “But they’ll keep you safe. You’ll get back to ARGUS in one piece and get assigned another, new AI, and they’ll keep you safe, and alive. And, with that knowledge, I know I can be at peace.”

Derek allowed himself a few moments of silence following this, feeling the uncomfortable, wet trickle of tears trailing over the line of his nose, salty on his lips. “AI battery check,” he croaked.

“Battery at thirty-five percent, estimated battery life one-hundred and eighteen point three hours remaining,” Stiles answered.

Time was running out.

 

 

Even being as careful as possible, it was unavoidable that Derek would have to engage at least one enemy before getting out of Zeta Base. The only comfort in the situation was that, at least, the Vu was by themselves and facing away from the opening of the vent. Derek dropped from the ceiling and landed silently in a crouch, and then the next moment he’d disengaged the Prog Knife from the pylon and shot forward. He managed to grip the creature’s head enough to jam the blade through the metal plates of its covering and sever the artery, but unlike the previous Vu he’d taken care of, this one let out a horrific, spine-tingling shriek. Panicking, Derek dropped the Prog Knife and clamped both his gloved hands around the creature’s head, using the momentum of the alien’s movement to lift his body up and wrap his legs around the Vu’s torso. Aided by the surgically-clean cut of the vibroblade, Derek used their combined movement and his upper-body strength to twist viciously, the hard exoskeleton sliding in his grip as the head turned unnaturally, and then clean off. A gush of grey-green, viscous blood gushed over him, and then the enemy crumpled to the ground, twitching.

“Oh, fucking _gross,_ ” he spat, flicking his arms quickly to one side to dispel the worst of the tacky blood. “We need to get out of here, and fast. I don’t know how well sound travels through these corridors, or how well Vu can hear, but that noise was loud, and there’s no possible way to hide this body.” He looked with disgust at the mangled mass on the ground, insect-like limbs twisted horribly, the floor and walls of the narrow corridor covered in sprays of its blood.

“Derek,” Stiles breathed, “We’re close. Like… really close.”

Derek gathered up the fallen Prog Knife, cleaned it hastily on the only (semi-clean) piece of fabric left on the fallen Vu, and slid it back into the pylon. Bringing his eyes back to the map on the inside, he startled to see that they were, indeed, close. A couple of corridors let, and then they would be back into the main entrance room, where one side door opened to lead them back down into the metal walkway and back into the base’s carriers, back to their ship.

“Shit. Shit, Derek, there’s – okay, follow this route.” A blinking yellow route established itself on the map, leading towards the main room, but off to one side of the corridors. “And hide in there, quickly.” Derek tore a bit of unsoiled cloth from the body of the Vu and wiped the soles of his boots, making sure he wouldn’t leave behind obvious, gloopy footprints that would lead any Vu discovering their fallen comrade straight to them, and then tossed the fabric to one side. Wordlessly, he followed Stiles’ instructions, keeping his senses on high alert for sounds and making sure he left no visible traces in his wake. He swiftly dashed inside and shut the door behind him, crouching low behind an upturned desk.

“What’s going on?” he asked breathlessly, taking a quick mouthful of stale water from the IDB, his eyes roaming over the stats of his suit. His oxygen was starting to run low, probably the reason for his shortness of breath. He had a couple of hours left, but unless they hurried back into the ship and activated the Secondary Oxygen Pack, he was in dire straits. Stiles’ battery was also diminishing, and quickly. They had no time to lose.

“My proximity alarms are through the roof,” Stiles mumbled, panicked. “I’m seeing at least twelve life forms of an approximate Vu size in the entrance room just before the walkway to the carriers. They’re guarding the exits, Derek. I don’t think they’ve spotted the ship yet, there’s no one in the docks and the door is sealed tight, but it’s going to be an absolute bastard to get in.”

“It’s the last hurdle, Stiles,” Derek breathed, willing his body to slow down, take measured breaths and conserve his oxygen carefully. “Think of it as the final boss fight. One last big push, and then we’re home free to collect the victory medals from the base and write our names in the high scores tab.”

“I don’t know how we’re going to do this,” Stiles babbled, sounding as if he were exhaling in short, sharp gasps. Derek had one of his soldiers in a previous mission have a panic attack, and it sounded an awful lot similar. At least the disjointed, broken words and the shortness of breath did. Could artificial humans even _have_ panic attacks? He shook his head, hard – now wasn’t the time to waste thoughts on trivial matters.

“Do you have a plan?”

“I th-ught I did,” Stiles blipped, the _ACTIVE_ icon fuzzing out of focus, sending a cold wave of worry over Derek. Stiles was well and truly on his way to shutting down completely. “I hadn't expected there to be so many of them, all located in such a small area, and indoors. I couldn’t possibly try pulling something elaborate off to try – no, there’s too many of them, it’s never going to work. Shit. _Shit_. We’re so fucked right now.”

“Stiles-”

“I can’t do it, Derek, you’ve seen me trying to hack into the mainframe when I’m Overcl- when I’m like _this_. I’m a fucking _mess_. I’m going to fail, I’ll malfunction and stop working right when we need me to work the best, and you’re going to _die_ because of me. And even if we _do_ make it out alive, I’m done for anyway, what happens if the ship’s autopilot doesn’t work and then you’re stranded?”

“Stiles, _calm down_.” Derek urged.

“They’ll _pair you with another AI_ ,” Stiles wailed, inconsolable and sounding on the edge of hysteria. “Maybe even another Stiles! And it won’t be _me_! You know that, right? It won’t – it won’t be me.”

Derek unclipped the cover on his suit and pulled Stiles’ chip out, activating the holographic projection of the young man. Stiles was crumpled to the base of the chip, clutching helplessly at his knees, his shoulders, anything he could hold onto for an incorporeal being. His eyes were round and panicked and huge, and when they looked at Derek, heartbreakingly desperate and sorrowful.

“I can’t. _Derek_ , I can’t. You’ll die. _You’ll die_. I _can’t._ ” he gasped, moaning beseechingly.

“Stiles, listen to me,” Derek murmured, injecting as much calm into his voice as he could. His younger cousin used to have panic attacks. He’d been able to talk Bródy from second platoon down from one last year. Surely, he could do this for his AI, for his friend.

“Nobody’s replacing you,” he said, his words low and warm, carefully measured and, for once, not suppressed or edited by his rational-thinking brain. “Nothing could replace you. Nothing in all the planets in every galaxy. Nothing that resides even in the farthest reaches of the cosmos. Now, I didn’t come this far to lose you now, to a panic attack that’s clouding your judgement. You’re brilliant, you always have been. And I know, with every last fucking fibre of my existence, that I’m going to get you back to ARGUS. I’m going to get you the help you need, and we’ll make it out of here, and then you’re going to get fixed and we’re going to have more ridiculous arguing over stupid shit that has no consequence or relevance to anything, as usual.”

Stiles gaped at him, mouth opening and closing like a fish, and his shoulders heaved a little less, moving a little more evenly, as if his breath were calming down. Derek guided him through it, slowly, instructing him as if he would a regular person, just like he did with Bródy, only without the hand on his shoulder to anchor him down.

“You can do this,” he whispered, once Stiles had calmed down. He raised the chip at eye-level, staring right at Stiles through the visor on his helmet, his eyes focused and honest. “Stiles, you can do this. I trust you. I trust you with my life, and I trust you to come up with another one of your usual, great plans to get us out of this mess. But in turn, you need to trust me enough to pull it off. And I promise, on my word as a Lycan, on my heart and the pull of Great Mother Moon, that I’ll get us safely home.”

Stiles’ small throat worked, as if he was swallowing a lodged lump, and he took in a great, shuddering breath. “Alright,” he whispered shakily, wobblingly getting to his feet, “I trust you. And you trust me. I’ve – I have a plan.”


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Almost at the end, guys! 
> 
> I seriously couldn't have done this chapter (as usual) without the help and assistance from the best beta in the world [BookGeekGrrl](http://bookgeekgrrl.tumblr.com/), who made sense of my ramblings, terrible grammar mistakes and half-finished sentences (that's what typing the story up on notepad on your phone will do to you).
> 
> Also, many thanks to [The Divine Fool](http://the-divine-fool.deviantart.com/) on DeviantArt for drawing this amazing companion image for the story!

“And you’re sure that you can pull it off?” Derek asked, feeling a little incredulous and a whole lot impressed. “It’s a pretty tall order, especially when the only thing we’ve got to work for us in an abandoned station that’s been out of use for ages.”

“Most of the equipment is old, but still useable,” Stiles replied. “It’s going to be a bit difficult, but hopefully we can pull it off. If anything, it’s going to be stupidly anticlimactic. I know how you like to go down in a blaze of glory and all that. Maybe you’re just disappointed we’re not going so far as to have an ultimate showdown at the door, heroically fighting them off one by one and setting a bomb to go off just as we fly away for extra dramatic effect.”

“As much as I’d love to blast this entire station to bits, it’s out of our jurisdiction,” he smirked. “The best we can do is get back to ARGUS as soon as possible and alert Argent to the Vu activity on the asteroid. Hopefully, he can send in a team to annihilate these cockroaches from the base altogether.”

“It probably won’t happen, to be honest.” The AI made a displeased sound as Derek plugged him back into the server. “God, I _hate_ these old power cables. Anyway – yeah, they’ll probably vacate Zeta Base as soon as they can, unless they’re a particularly stubborn group of Vu, which, actually come to think of it, they could be, never mind then.”

“What’s your battery like? Will it be enough to do this and get you back to ARGUS?”

“Battery at twenty-nine percent. Estimated battery life ninety-eight point zero-two hours. I think that should just be enough.”

“It’s depleting pretty fast,” Derek commented, “You’re almost at a quarter.”

“I’m not going to lie to you.” Stiles raised his eyes to Derek’s, “This little stunt I’m going to pull will really take a chunk of my batteries. I’ll be lucky if I’m above five percent after this. And coupled with my Overclocked status, I don’t know how well I’m going to be able to work after it.”

“I’m going to plug you into a power source as soon as we get inside the ship, don’t worry,” the Naut assured him, gripping the edge of the table tight enough with his hands to dent the metal.

“You just focus on getting inside the ship first, and getting it on course for ARGUS. Make that your priority, and _then_ look out for me. Otherwise I’ll kick your ass.” He chuckled, a little less mirth than usual, but a relieving sound nevertheless. “I don’t know how, yet, but I’ll find a way.” He stretched his hands out, his miniature, surprisingly broad shoulders scrunching upwards, and then down into a stiff line. “So we’re clear on the plan, then?”

“You’re going to hack into the PR intercom and set off the speakers in every single room of the base with a directional noise to make it sound as if it’s being invaded, including audio effects like our ray-emission guns to sound like conflict,” Derek repeated the plan, almost word for word. “Then, after the initial announcement, you’ll use the directional speakers to make the conflict sound as if it’s heading towards the north side of the base, as far from the carriers as possible.”

“Correctamundo. Oh, don’t forget the part about blowing shit up.”

“I hadn't gotten to that yet,” he rolled his eyes. “Right after the announcement, you’ll tap into the gases reserves on the north side and cause a diversion by ‘blowing shit up’, as you so eloquently put it.”

“I really hope there’s enough hydrogen and oxygen left in the reserve tanks for this,” Stiles muttered, already beginning to hack into the mainframe. “I’ll start opening the valves now to let the pressure build, and then if I focus enough current on one of the wires in the circuitry board close to it, it’ll overheat enough to set a spark off. Oh, yeah, before I forget,” he turned around and aimed a wink in Derek’s direction, something that shouldn’t have made Derek’s stomach feel fluttery, especially during such a dangerous time in their operation. “You might wanna activate the silencers in your helmet. It’s gonna get pretty loud in here in a few minutes.”

“Thanks for letting me know,” Derek drawled, nevertheless flicking open the control panel on his armband and activating it himself, since Stiles was occupied elsewhere. Strangely enough, the moment he muted his helmet, Stiles waved his arm at him to get his attention back. “What is it?” he asked worriedly, unmuting his helmet.

“Look, just before we start the decoy system, I feel like I should maybe say something here. Something deep and meaningful and stupidly heroic, in case something fucks up, or the Overclocking gets the best of me. Something really cool, you know?”

“I don’t know if that’s even possible with you,” Derek deadpanned, feeling something leaden drop in the pit of his stomach. “Also, I’m pretty sure that heartfelt, inspiring speeches don’t usually start with an introduction.”

“Oh, you’re a dumbass,” Stiles said, but his tone was immensely fond. “I just wanted to say – you know, I mean,” he took a deep breath, looked down at his feet for a moment, seeming to gather his wits. “Derek, I – I don’t know how we’re supposed to function as AIs. Even after so many years of being active I don’t know how to function properly myself, since technically I’m only a chip of wires and modulated synapses. But – if I had to properly analyse what I felt when I was with you, when we were working together – I think that, if I were human, it’d be called ‘happiness’.”

“Jesus, Stiles,” he choked out, throat tightening. Everything seemed to constrict into the small space between them, the palpable feel of emotion in his chest that seemed to overflow with everything he felt for his partner. Somehow, in the amount of time they’d spent together, Stiles had changed in his eyes from something that had been forcibly thrust upon him, to a person he genuinely cared about. He hadn't expected to get so attached to the smart-mouthed, sharp-witted ball of hyperactive energy. And yet here they were, about to do something incredibly stupid and heroic together, and all Derek could think about was how much he’d grown to _care_ for Stiles, how terrified he felt that this could very well be their final moments together. And here he was, feeling as emotionally stunted as Laura always joked he was, unable to vocalise just how much Stiles meant to him.

“I know,” Stiles continued, “that we don’t have much time left. But I feel like if I don’t tell you now, I might not get the chance to do it again.” He chuckled, running a hand through his hair, which, surprisingly, rumpled under his fingers like regular, real-life hair. Derek was struck with a sudden, gut-clenching _want_ to feel Stiles’ hair under his own hands.

“There must be something faulty in my wiring,” Stiles continued, “because over the time we’ve been together, as short as it was, I’ve wanted nothing more than to step off the holographic display console and touch you.” And _fuck_ , that was the sentence that felt like a cold punch to the stomach for him, because how many times had he thought the same thing himself, but waved his emotions off at the sheer ridiculousness of it? How many times had he wished he could have traced the gentle upturn of Stiles’ nose with his fingertips, placed his hands on the narrowness of his slender waist, only to chide himself for thinking such thoughts about a _computer program_. But Stiles had, to him, become less and less artificial with every day that had passed, and more and more human, without him seeming to even notice.

“You never said anything,” he said, haltingly. The unspoken _I didn’t say anything either_ hung between them, heavy.

“I thought I’d have more time,” Stiles croaked, words full of a heated longing that Derek couldn’t believe was directed at him, couldn’t fathom that it was _reciprocated_. “But it’s true. Even though I don’t have skin, or touch receptors – well, not without an android suit, anyway. I’ve always wanted to touch you. To feel you. Even more than I wanted to hug Scott, to be honest. In retrospect, I should have looked into an android suit when we were back at ARGUS. Now, it might just be too late.” He went silent for a moment, swallowing heavily again. “Even if we – they say that our AI units can self-deactivate. If we don’t – if we can’t, out of here…” his voice cracked, sounding truly heartbroken. “I don’t want to be an active unit without you.”

“You can’t just _say_ stuff like that, Stiles, _Christ_ ,” Derek mumbled, “Not now, when I can’t do anything about it.”

“What do you mean by that?” Stiles asked, face drawn in confusion.

“I feel the same,” Derek said quickly. “Stiles, everything you’ve just said – I feel the same way, too. This isn’t the time or the place for this sort of thing, but,” he paused, trying to think of what to say next, in the limited amount of time they had left. Neither of them knew what would happen when Stiles began their plan, or how it would turn out in the end. But these final few minutes could be all that they had left, and hadn't they promised to be truthful to each other now? If ever there was a time for honesty, it would be then and there. “I care about you too much, more than a regular Naut should for his AI partner. I don’t – shit,” he growled with frustration, wishing he were somehow better at expressing himself through words, that he could somehow manage to convey the expansive depth of his feelings towards Stiles. To tell him that, what he felt, he hadn't experienced before, and was near certain that he would never feel again, not if Stiles... Well, if ever there was a time to be completely honest with his partner, now would be it.  
  
"I can't let you die," he said firmly, jaw clenched. "Or become Overclocked, or deactivated, or whatever it is that happens to AIs. You're too important to me for that to happen. You're more than just a military partner to me now." He floundered for a moment, unsure of whether or not he should voice the feelings that had been steadily building up inside, but he supposed that he might as well, since they were figuratively jumping out of the frying pan and into the fire. "...You're Pack."  
  
Not many understood the significance of being Pack to a Lycan. The hierarchy was likened by scientists to wolf packs, but even then the Pack dynamics weren't properly understood. Being part of a Pack was not easily earned, but as a general rule, humans understood it as a familiar unit with a hierarchical tree and a primary alpha leader. Study after study into Lycan Pack mentality had been conducted, but there was one universally accepted idea, and that was that, to a Lycan, Pack was everything, the notion that individuals combined to create a bigger, more important whole.

Derek, being a born Lycan, knew and felt the importance of Pack more keenly than those of his kind that had been turned, the burning intensity of needing the support system of Pack and Family. His admission that Stiles was Pack was nothing to be taken lightly. The only non-Lycan members accepted into the fold were those whose trust had accumulated over years, or significant others, spouses and lovers. And, judging by the overwhelmed look on Stiles’ face, he understood the importance of the admission all too well.

“Look, just stay alive, okay?” he snapped, self-conscious.

“Whatever you say, boss.”

 

 

They briefly ran through it one final time before initiating it, because they wouldn’t have the time for hesitating, or talking, once the sirens were activated. Stiles focused the entirety of his attention on spreading his consciousness throughout the facility’s electrical network. Even though Derek’s helmet was padded and the earpieces set to mute, the noise that blared, suddenly and violently, made him hiss with discomfort. He couldn’t imagine how painful and shocking it must be to those without ear protection. The ear-splitting racket went on and on, Stiles obviously pulling out all the stops he could to bring hell to the entire base.

The AI had cobbled together a sound file of environmental noises from his memory and database, so the air was filled with all-too-human shouts, and the noisy shriek of ray-emission pistols being fired, the simulation as realistic as if the base were suddenly overrun with dozens of Naut soldiers. Distantly, Derek thought he could hear the familiar shouts of Scott from the mission he’d witnessed in the video file Stiles had shown him earlier. The thunderous commotion only got louder as the explosions began, making the entire base tremble with the force of the blasts and the ground beneath Derek’s feet shudder. Poised in a ready crouch beside the terminal, Derek kept his eyes trained on the door in case errant Vu came through, counting each detonation as it occurred by the dull burst and the intermittent vibrations beneath the soles of his boots.

He counted a total of eight explosions, which was a miracle in itself that out of the usual ten tanks in storage, eight still had enough gas in them to cause a reaction.

He felt as if the air in his lungs had been replaced with lead, because it was time, and he couldn’t ever remember feeling more anxious. He switched on the hearing inside the helmet, eyes suddenly stinging and almost doubling over when the sound hit him, like a sledgehammer to his sensitive ears. Pressing close to the door, he could hear the panicked, heavy footfalls of the Vu outside, clamouring and flustered in their shrill clicking language as the commotion successfully unnerved them. Derek brought his eyes back to Stiles, standing still on his chip, and gasped with concern as the little blue hologram blinked in and out of focus repeatedly, so fuzzy around the edges that he looked less corporeal than ever, little more than a vague human-shaped light.

“Stiles,” he hissed, sliding on his knees to the port and easing the old cable out of the side of the chip as gently as he could. “You alright? AI battery check,” he prompted, cradling the chip in the palm of his gloved hand. The chip was so light that he barely felt its presence, something that he’d never really paid attention to before. Seeing Stiles in this state made him feel, with a sick twist in his gut, as if he were looking at a ghost.

“-attery -…-ife…” Stiles could barely stutter the words out. His voice was less human and more static, the harsh buzz of it marring his syllables and making him almost unintelligible. “-iv- p-rcen-… …-ife approx-… -ixteen-poi…-nine hours…”

It sounded like a lot, close to seventeen hours, more than enough to last them the six-hour trip back to ARGUS once they secured their ship from the docking bay. But Stiles’ battery had been depleting at such a rapid pace due to his Overclocking that Derek wasn’t sure he could even last that long. He didn’t even know if he could pull apart any cables from the ship to feed into his chip as an outside battery source, because while his Naut training gave him plenty of education on technology, he wasn’t nearly as much of an expert in computers as Peter, or hell, even Laura. He was the brawns of their Lycan unit; Peter had said the words himself repeatedly.

“Hold on, Stiles,” he mumbled, gripping the pistol in his hand tightly and sliding the AI chip back into his suit. “We’re gonna get out of here.”

The map on the inside of his helmet showed no Vu activity in the corridor. Derek shifted into his Beta form, almost staggering with how much of a struggle it was. On a normal day, his Beta shift came to him as easily as slipping into a well-worn item of clothing.  It wasn’t a completely effortless shift; after all he had to will his body to physically metamorphose into a different form. But running on the last dregs of his energy, without sleep or food, barely sustained by the stale water in his IDB, the shift was extraordinarily demanding. It knocked the wind from his lungs for a few moments, making him feel dizzy for a spell, but it made his body that little bit faster, slightly stronger and honing his reflexes to their maximum capacity. He’d probably pass out the moment he sat still, but he needed to be as focused as possible, at least until they secured the ship and he got himself and Stiles safely on the way back to ARGUS.

He dashed down the corridor, all concept of keeping quiet abandoned in the chaotic blares of the sirens and the deafening noise of the imaginary Nauts. With the blood pounding in his ears, Derek scrambled down the hallway, twisting around the corner of the corridor so hard that he swore he heard his backbone creak in protest. Hunkering his shoulders downwards, he used the bulk of his body combined with the momentum of his running to smash through the doorway leading through to the hangar, not letting himself think of anything except the final goal of stepping inside the airship.

Most of the Vu had cleared out from the entrance room to the carriers in the chaos, and Derek counted five with his keen eyes as he bolted through. The element of surprise was on his side enough that he managed to fire his pistol and take down two of them before they could alert the others, before rolling forward and ducking behind a slab of concrete, narrowly avoiding the shots fired from the remaining Vu. He switched the sound on his helmet back on, hissing when the shrieking noises hit his eardrums and almost scrambled his brain, but he needed to hear everything that was happening, needed to hear the directional noise of the enemy Vu if he was to get past them successfully. The gunshots that scattered behind and around the shielding wall of rock indicated that there was one to his left, closer to the entrance, and two to his right, closer to the doorway leading to the carrier. The internal map of his helmet switched off completely, and his eyes immediately flickered to Stiles’ _ACTIVE_ icon.

It wasn’t on anymore.

Derek’s fangs pricked through his gums as he gave a throat-burning roar, panic and rage fuelling his exhausted body. Scrambling from his hiding place, he dove to the left and fired in quick succession, felling the lone Vu. A sharp lunge sideways and he ran forward, weaving quickly and keeping his finger pressed heavily on the trigger, letting out volley after volley of fire as he gunned down one of the two remaining Vu and managed to shoot the cobbled-together pistol of the final one out of its hands. Derek’s arm reached behind his back and he yanked the Prog Knife roughly from its pylon. With ruthless efficiency and speed borne from his altered state and blood-boiling frenzy, he roared again as he jammed the blade of the dagger into the eye socket of the creature, his snarls drowned out by the noise, only added to by the gurgling hiss of the alien as it crumpled to the ground, gore bubbling and squirting from its ruined face.

Derek only spared the convulsing body a moment to ensure that the Vu was dead, or close enough that it wouldn’t pose an immediate danger, before shifting back on his heel and taking off towards the carriers. His suit felt tight and constricting, the unforgiving armour plates barely shifted to accommodate his bulkier Beta form, like the oppressive, uncomfortable tightness of a shoe being too small, except he felt it all over. His breathing was heavy and laboured, huffed out against the diode screen of his helmet, creating a patch of damp mist close to his face while his heart beat at a rattled staccato. Time was desperately running out for Stiles, if it hadn't already.

He wrenched open the sliding door and thundered down the narrow metal walkway towards the main carrier, gun held at a ready position as the iron structure shuddered with his heavy footfalls. By some miracle, the conduit was free of Vu, probably because they didn’t have the numbers to patrol each and every small passageway of the large base. Even more astonishing, Derek found his ship where it had been left, seemingly untouched and undisturbed. With no time to lose, Derek pressed the activation pad on the side of the ship open and punched in his access code, fingers made blunt and graceless by the neoprene of his gloves. It took him two attempts to input his code in correctly, shaking with adrenaline and stress, beads of sweat trickling down the back of his neck and between his shoulder blades. The swooping swish of the hatch door sliding open was the sweetest sound he’d heard since the beginning of their getaway plan, which had commenced barely fifteen minutes ago yet felt like an eternity and a half.

Derek practically threw himself into the console seat, twisting the hatch level down and locking the lever in a closed position so fast that he swore he felt the tendons in his wrist strain precipitously close to snapping. No longer caring about stealth, he flicked all the switches and punched in the coordinates for ARGUS' current position with a speed that only pure desperation could give him. The engines roared to life, and he pulled the throttle back with a vicious yank, wrenching the ship into the air. Another few switches engaged the manual controls of the ship, and his grip around the steering wheel was tight as he manoeuvred the small aircraft through the still-open hangar doors.  
  
A few Vu raced out from the doorway, enraged and firing at his ship with their stolen weapons. They did hardly any real damage to the thick outer shell of his ship, and if Derek had more time on his hands, he would have had no qualms about turning the ship around and releasing volley after volley of ammunition from the wide-barrelled guns all standard military vehicles came equipped with. But petty vindictiveness aside, Derek had one objective, and that was to return himself and Stiles back to ARGUS as soon as possible.  
  
He didn't realise he'd been holding his breath until they'd cleared the gravitational pull of the asteroid and the ship was locked on course to ARGUS. It took actual, concentrated effort to unclench his death grip on the steering wheel and force his breathing to a more normal pace, forcing his physical body to retract the claws and elongated fangs of his Beta shift. Now that there was nothing for him to do, nothing but stillness in the quiet cabin of the aircraft, Derek finally felt the immeasurably long hours of fatigue weighing him down. Gingerly, he flicked the cover open on the chip insert over the breastplate of his suit and extracted Stiles’ microprocessor. With shaking fingers, he slid the tiny CPU into the console slot made specifically for housing AI chips. The ship wasn’t equipped with enough power to recharge an AI, but it could keep them running at their current processing power without drawing too much energy from its base functions.

"Stiles?" he murmured, watching the lax metallic component sit, unmoving and unresponsive. None of the light synapses or components were on, indicating that the power to it had completely exhausted itself. Derek felt his body tremble, eyes riveted to Stiles' chip, his throat clogging with despair. They hadn't gone so far into infested Vu territory for Stiles to be... to not be... Christ, he couldn't even bring himself to think of it. His fingertips made shallow dents in the top of the metal surface from how hard he was clutching at it.  
  
Faintly, ever so lightly, a small shimmer of blue emitted from the central point of the chip, where the holographic projector was located and where Stiles' human-body manifestation would float from. It was so faint and small that Derek would have missed it altogether, had he not been staring intensely at the chip. Nothing projected upwards, but the barely perceptible glow gave him enough hope that Stiles' battery wasn't completely drained, that, plugged into a power source of the ship, he might just make it back to ARGUS in time.  
  
Overcome with tiredness, fatigued beyond words and sore from his injuries and the constant state of hyper-awareness he'd inflicted on his body and mind, Derek let himself finally succumb to his exhaustion. Slumping back heavily in his chair, he let his arms fall back from the console and fold into his lap, and shut his eyes. He still had just less than six hours before the ship reached ARGUS, and there was no point staying awake when there was nothing he could do. He was asleep between one breath and the next.  
  
The entire mission had only lasted fifty-seven hours, less than two and a half days.  
  
  


  
  
It was the proximity sensors going off that startled Derek from his fitful sleep. The alarm sounded just as his ship approached the large mother ship, the tinny voice of air traffic control speaking their coordinates and approximate landing time from their console on bridge. Shaking himself fully awake, Derek twisted his head to one side and then the other, working the crick out of his neck from sleep. The emotional and physical drain had been so strong that he hadn't moved an inch from where he'd fallen asleep, but his body had been at too awkward an angle to be considered anything but excruciating.  
  
His relief at hearing another person's voice after so long was short-lived. Everything that had happened seemed to come crashing down all at once. Stiles' chip was still immobile and silent, dark save for the barely-perceptible glow from its core.

The time between waking up to landing safely inside the carrier was barely ten minutes, but Derek grew more and agitated with every moment that passed. A team of engineers rushed forward the moment the air-lock security engaged, swarming over his battered ship like a frantic swarm of bees. Derek shoved the door open forcefully with the sole of his boot, lurching forward with Stiles’ chip cradled protectively in his gloved hand. With his other, he ripped off the helmet that had been constricting him for so long, taking a deep lungful of air that wasn’t processed through his oxygen tank.

“I need to see Doctor Mahealani,” he growled, shaking off a medic who was trying to grab his arm and lead him to the sick bay. “ _Now!_ ”

 

 

There was an inquiry into the entire thing, and an exorbitant amount of yelling. Some of it was from the engineers, incensed at the state of his ship which – alright, it wasn’t in the _best_ of shape, but the damage was mostly to the outer shell and nothing was structurally busted. Dents and scratched and scorch marks from ray-emission pistols were easy enough to buff out or replace the panels on completely. The majority of the yelling came from Laura, on a multitude of levels. Thankfully, much of her vitriol was directed at Commander Argent for even working with Mahealani on the idea, let alone authorising such a ridiculous mission to begin with. Argent hadn't known Zeta Base had been occupied by Vu. Allocating Derek to what he’d assumed was a simple in-and-out assignment was probably the best of the worst idea, because at least his advanced Lycan abilities had at least afforded him a more than marginal chance at survival in such unfavourable conditions. That didn’t stop Laura screaming at him. Derek wasn’t there to see it in person, but judging from the Commander’s chagrined appearance when expressing his apologies, Laura had probably flashed fangs and eyes. Argent was a brave man, but Laura could peel paint off walls with her regular glare when prompted. And considering Argent approved a mission with barely any factual information which could have very well cost the life of a member of her pack, well, nobody would have wanted to trade places with him for all the credit-chips in the galaxy.

Derek didn’t escape completely unscathed from Laura’s wrath, however. She punched the daylights out of him when they reunited on the tarmac, but that was mostly Laura’s way of expressing affection and concern, so he didn’t take it to heart too much. But when he refused to be assessed by the medics, Laura had effectively yelled him into submission and frog-marched him into the infirmary to get checked out, and then loomed from a corner while the physicians looked him over with an intimidated set of their shoulders. (It was somewhat difficult to loom from such a distance, especially considering the disadvantage of not having the height to do so, but when Laura put her mind to something, it was never half-assed.)

Before anything else, however, before the medics and the yelling and the inquisitions, before the punching and the relieved hugging and the formal apology from the higher-ups, Derek had gone to see Doctor Mahealani, clutching Stiles’ chip to his chest. And he’d done something he had never in his life done before.

He’d begged.

Unashamedly and unapologetically, he’d begged the scientist to help Stiles, to do anything and everything in his power to save him. Because, _fuck_ , he’d seen the surveillance tapes and Stiles’ history, he knew that reviving an Overclocked AI was possible, had been done before.

In the three days since, Derek had been reprimanded four separate times for skulking around the corridors of the science labs. Laura had scolded him for snapping his teeth at the patrolling security guards that asked him to move along, if only for the fact that (directly quoted) 'the murderous face he had was making the scientists too scared to leave the labs'.  
  
Doctor Mahealani, at least, was somewhat understanding. "Many people seem to forget that AIs aren't just computer programs," he said cheerfully as Derek bumped into him (or, to be precise, cornered him) as he picked up a coffee and a bowl of fruit and yoghurt. "Spending such an extended period of time with them turns them into something else entirely. More of a companion, if you will." His gaze was knowing, and Derek shuffled awkwardly in place, grabbing a container of melon pieces to pretend he wasn't there for the sole purpose of accosting someone. He fiddled with the lid of the carton and moved along the line with Danny to the cashier, intent on purchasing it – even if he despised rockmelon and its weird taste.  
  
"How is... How's-"  
  
"It's not coming along as easily as I'd hoped," Mahealani sighed, running a hand through his hair and grimacing. All pretence of being ignorant to Derek's viewing of the tapes had disappeared. "It had taken me ages to restore Stiles from his previous Overclocked state. The last time, at least, Stiles was still somewhat functional, even if I did have to wire him up to an external power source. This time, though?"  
  
He shook his head ruefully, tapping his credit chip across the reader at the front counter and gathering his purchases. "His battery is completely shot. The situation is... Well, it's a little difficult to explain."  
  
Derek doggedly followed him to one of the small tables in the cafeteria, sitting opposite him and planting his hands flat on the stainless steel surface. "Just tell me," he said, trying not to sound like he was begging.  
  
"Usually, when machines, especially computers and AIs with heavy processing power, have their batteries drained to a specifically low number, they enter a power-saving mode."  
  
"Like Standby Mode?" Derek asked, thinking back to his home computer and the old laptop that barely chugged along sitting on the desk in his room, the one Laura called 'DinoTop'.  
  
"Not necessarily," Danny continued, "We're talking about Sleep Mode. The two terms, Standby and Sleep, are often confused in their similarity. Standby Mode refers to the electric power consumed by electronic and electrical appliances, such as the AIs, while they are switched off, but are still designed to draw some power. Despite not operating, Standby still consumes power without offering any features - we also call it 'no load' power, 'phantom load' or even the simple term 'leaking electricity'. In short, Standby would still cause an AI to use its battery. But I digress. When down to a depleted battery number, an AI will switch to Sleep Mode. Machine state is held in RAM and, when placed in Sleep Mode, the computer cuts power to unneeded subsystems and places the RAM into a minimum power state, just sufficient to retain its data."  
  
"So Stiles entered Sleep Mode, then?" Derek raised his eyebrows, a little thrown by the technological jargon. "If he went into a minimum power state, then wouldn't that mean that he can just be recharged and fixed?"  
  
"As you've probably already guessed, Derek, it's far, far more complicated than that." Danny smiled sadly, stirring the berries and muesli into his yoghurt with a plastic spoon. "You see, a computer MUST consume some energy while 'sleeping' in order to power the RAM and to be able to respond to a wake-up event. Stiles, however – we’ve got a tonne of problems. Firstly, there’s the damage to the chip itself caused by how hard he worked. He increased the voltage to his system to abnormally high limits, damaging his RAM and his northbridge – part of his microchip that is connected directly to his CPU, his central processing unit, and is responsible for tasks that require the highest performance. His video card is completely fried, because the Overclocking raised his core speed and voltage to such a degree that it overvolted into degradation.”

“Wouldn’t you have a safety precaution to ensure it doesn’t happen?”

“Stiles overwrote it,” Danny replied, sticking a spoonful of yoghurt in his mouth. “The little bastard is more imaginative than anyone I’ve ever met in my life. He was always a quick learner, always clever, but I’d never imagined, when I first coded him, that he’d become such a resourceful pain in the ass.” His tone was fond, but the look on his face betrayed his despondency. “All hardware we’ve created at ARGUS, including AIs, have overheating protection. When they reach a certain heat from running that could be detrimental to their system, they enter a state of ‘thermal shutdown’ before any damage occurs. Stiles was already running on low battery when he went all-out. Looking through his coding, it appears that he manually overrode the thermal shutdown control before it activated, allowing him to function until he’d drained the very last of his power.”

“What are you telling me?” Derek asked, the dread inside of his chest building.

Danny spread his hands out in a helpless gesture. “Stiles exerted himself above and beyond all possible parameters to help get the both of you out of Zeta Base – to the point where I’m not sure if it can be fixed. His chip is damaged to such an extent that it could cause him irreversible behavioural damage, maybe even wipe his memory and personality completely. And as far as even getting in there to look around, well…,” he dug the spoon into the yoghurt cup and grimaced. “Stiles never does anything half-assed. He really went all-out for you, Derek, but there’s not even enough power left in his system to trigger a wake-up event.”

“So you’re telling me Stiles is… you can’t fix him?” Derek clenched his hands into fists against the table’s top, barely controlling his urge to rip the steel rods of the legs from their base screwed against the floor and fling the entire table across the room with rage. Instead, he kept his eyes fixed to the plastic container of melon pieces between his fists, at the droplets of condensation gathering on the inside of the lid. “There’s nothing you can do?”

“I never said that,” Danny clarified, eating another spoonful. “Nobody knows the ins and outs of Stiles better than the guy who created him. I’ve been working long enough in the labs that I’m confident I could take one apart and rebuild it with my eyes closed. By all accounts, Stiles’ chip is impossible to fix, irreversibly damaged. But I’ve never backed down from a challenge.” His eyes twinkled from behind his coffee cup as he took a sip.

“What do you need?” Derek demanded. “To fix Stiles, I mean.”

“Time,” Danny responded, his expression serious once more. “Patience. Retrieving data from an AI, especially one that’s been through the wringer like Stiles, is a delicate and lengthy procedure. I’m not even going to be able to give you a guesstimate on when it might end, because frankly, I don’t know.” He tapped his finger against the table top rhythmically, deep in thought. “I may have to order some new parts in from our labs on Earth.”

Derek slammed his credit chip on the table, shoulders square and tense. The scientist fixed him with an inquisitive look, and he shifted awkwardly in his seat.

“There’s – after the inquisition of Zeta Base, I got – there was compensation money.”

“I was aware of that, yes,” Danny responded, his countenance carefully neutral.

“And – in the six years here, I haven’t spent much – there hasn’t been a need to. Before.” His words sounded pathetic to his own ears. “But this. It’s – Stiles. He’s important.”

“Derek –”

“There’s money on there too, from my own account,” he ploughed on, determinedly, “To order whatever parts you need, to help fix him. Use however much you need. If it’s not enough, if it maxes out, let me know and I’ll load it up with more credits.”

“You’re wanting to _buy_ the AI, then?” Danny asked. “You do realise, Derek, that AIs are government property, especially the military AIs. And, last I heard from your squadron Alpha, Laura, there had been talk of finally retiring after this mission debacle. ”

“I know they’re expensive, but I’ll – I’ll take out a loan if I have to,” Derek babbled, desperate. “I’ll speak with Commander Argent, extend my military service. Stiles – he’s my partner. But he’s _Pack_.”

“I’d wondered what had made Stiles so special, to almost destroy himself to save you.” Danny sighed, standing up and abandoning his yoghurt. He picked up his coffee and Derek’s credit chip, tucking it carefully into ID holder pinned to his lab coat’s lapel. “But I see that he’s not the only one with such an overwhelming need to protect their partner.” He tucked his free hand in his pocket and smiled at Derek. “You’re his Pack too, you know.”

“Do whatever it takes,” Derek pleaded, “Just save him. _Please_ ”

“I’ll do my best,” Danny grinned, then turned on his heel and strode out of the cafeteria.

 

 

“Only my brother would be the first person in history to have a totally unique AI, form a Pack bond with them, and undergo a tragic Shakespearean-style separation,” Laura chided fondly, steadily making her way through a tray piled high with man ‘n’ cheese, Buffalo wings and more garlic bread than any one person should be able to eat in one sitting.

“Laura, stop teasing your brother when he’s pining while his true love is at the mechanic,” Peter sniffed, twirling spaghetti delicately on his fork. “It’s tacky.”

“M’not pining,” Derek mumbled through his mouthful of roast beef, not even looking up from his tray as he slapped his sister’s wandering hand away from the chocolate mousse on his tray.

“Whatever,” Laura rolled her eyes, heaping a spoonful of cheesy macaroni on a piece of bread, almost unhinging her jaw, and then shovelling the entire thing in her mouth. Peter curled his lip in distaste, but Derek hardly noticed anymore – strange what years of exposure therapy could do to someone. “It’s only been three and a bit months now since Zeta. You could at least _pretend_ to not be mooning over your electronic boy-toy for a few minutes so we can finalise our retirement paperwork and figure when we’re going to leave ARGUS for good. I wanna go back home in time for Earth summer and get way tan, Lycan healing or no.”

“That’s more than a little repulsive,” Peter pointed out as Laura mopped up cheese sauce with a Buffalo wing and then tore the meat off the bone with her teeth in one fluid movement. “You’re never going to find a husband with that kind of behaviour.”

“Then I shan’t marry,” Laura responded primly, sucking sauce off her thumb, “I’ll just have one torrid affair after the other and keep myself entertained that way. Better than having gigabytes worth of bodice-rippers on my tablet.”

“I’ll have you know Ms Hill is a national treasure, and most of those books are _classics_.”

“ _Oh_ , to experience the golden wings of love between rugged Torolf and bosomy Hilda,” Laura sighed dramatically, clutching at her imaginary pearls and falling into a pretend swoon. “If only my love were as timeless as that! Or as my brother and his faithful AI!”

“I’m almost eighty-five percent certain that I’m adopted now,” Derek grumbled, pushing his peas to one side with the edge of his fork and digging into his mashed potatoes.

“Now look here, Derek, that’s seven percent more than last week, and I’m not happy with the alarmingly exponential rate this statistic is rising,” his uncle admonished in jest, mopping up his sauce with bread.

“You love it anyway,” Laura teased, running her hand up Derek’s arm in her usual, fond way. Without even looking up from his meal, Peter ruffled Laura’s hair affectionately and Derek touched his fingertips back to her knuckles, instinctively returning the touch and revelling in the sense of belonging that their Pack bond afforded them through tactile affection. Humans who didn’t understand the notion of Pack only saw them as being touchy-feely around one another, but it was more than that – it was reaffirming scents, strengthening a familial connection that, hundreds of thousands of kilometres away from their home planet, needed as much strengthening as possible.

Just as he was thinking of how nice it’d be to finally settle down back on Earth, the message tone on his comms bracelet went off. Derek absently opened it, but immediately dropped his fork onto the tray with a loud clatter when the meaning of the words sunk in. Without giving the startled others an explanation, he took off at a run, hurtling through the cafeteria and down corridors as fast as his body could manage, glad that the other Nauts and personnel had the presence of mind to get out of his way – he couldn’t have slowed down if he’d tried.

He skidded to a halt outside the labs, where a man in a clipboard blinked unsurprised and pressed a button with his thumb on a – Derek squinted – a stopwatch.

“Record-breaking time,” he commented, jotting whatever numbers he’d gotten on his wrist, “Doctor Mahealani will be impressed with the results. I owe him twenty credits.”

“Is he-?” Derek puffed, feeling out of breath and like his entire body was constricting in a particularly anxious-feeling vise.

“He’s waiting for you inside. Last cubicle on the end, right hand side.”

Derek wasn’t about to wait for an embossed invitation. Grunting his thanks, he opened the door and stepped through quickly, trying not to bump or jostle any of the technicians as he strode through. He’d never been inside the tech labs before – the first time they’d introduced Stiles to him was in that meeting room, and all the compatibility tests between himself and AIs had been done in the infirmary’s labs. This place, full of wires and cables, shelves stocked high with mechanical parts, diode screens and keyboards everywhere, felt like an entirely new dimension to him. His heavy steps from his combat boots sounded loud in his ears as he got closer, almost drowning out the frantic thudding of his nervous pulse.

“Ah, Derek, good to see you,” Danny greeted him as he walked into the right cubicle, shutting the door behind him. “You got here pretty fast. Mehra owes me twenty credits.”

“Is this about Stiles?” he asked immediately, having no patience for small talk. He’d waited over three months since that day at the cafeteria, stifling the ever-increasing Lycan instinct to find Stiles, his lost Pack member, wherever he was, and _protect_ him. “Were you able to fix his chip?”

“First things first – I believe this belongs to you,” Danny handed him over his credit chip, which Derek took and absentmindedly shoved into the pocket of his uniform trousers. “I did end up spending a little of your money, unfortunately. ARGUS only covers so much in basic repairs, you see,” he waved a noncommittal hand. “But I had a talk with Commander Argent. It seems that, due to the circumstances of which your AI malfunctioned, it was covered under ARGUS as a military repair. All in all, for everything I needed, you ended up paying just a little over the credits they recompensed you with from the Zeta Base incident.”

“How is he?” Derek asked again, his throat dry. He didn’t care about the money – Mahealani could have drained his bank account dry, just as long as he’d somehow get Stiles back to him.

“There was more damage than I had ever thought possible. I had to make some modifications to his base coding. Stiles, well – he’s a little bit broken.”

“Broken how?”

“Well, he won’t be able to function as a Military AI again,” Danny sighed, crossing his arms. “He’s out of commission for that. After retrieving all the necessary data for ARGUS record-keeping out of him to free up more memory, Commander Argent had him decommissioned from the Naut program altogether. Knowing that you plan to retire early, he guessed that you might want your final payment bonus paid out in a different way, so he took the necessary credits and made the exchange with us at the lab here.” He smiled widely and extended his hands out in a grand gesture, as if congratulating himself on a job well-done. “Congratulations, Mister Hale, you’re the proud owner of a Standard Artificial Intelligence unit partner by the name of Sławomierz Czibor Stilinski, or Stiles, as he prefers to be called.”

Derek’s mind was spinning violently. Stiles was alive? Stiles was his partner again? Stiles was technically _his_? “I can’t believe it,” he muttered.

“Oh, believe it, alright,” Danny answered cheerfully. “Mehra should be bringing him along any moment – had to get his final check-up, you see. Now that his abilities have been downgraded and his processing power limited, his life-span should now be that of a regular AI, seventy to eighty years or so. But as much of a genius as I am, I couldn’t fix his – how did he refer to it? _Scintillating_? Yes, something like that. His _scintillating_ personality, I’m afraid, is still very much the same.”

The door of the lab cubicle opened again, admitting the first scientist followed by an unfamiliar figure in the simple white clothes that marked him as one of the lab techs. When the first man stepped to one side, however, Derek felt his breath catch in his throat, and his body froze, too stunned to move. He was unfamiliar with the colouring and the all-too-human scent coupled with the unmistakeable thudding sound of a live, beating, and human heart. But he could more than easily identify the slope of those shoulders, the recognizable, dear upturn of that nose and the familiar, lopsided grin aimed his way.

“Hello Derek,” Stiles said.


	9. Chapter 9

Time seemed to freeze completely for Derek as he stood still, eyes wide, staring at his AI partner. Except that now, instead of hovering a half-inch from his hologram projector base, he was standing with both feet solidly planted on the ground. Instead of barely a hand span high, Stiles was now full-sized, almost as tall as Derek himself.  
  
Derek found that he could barely breathe, his lungs feeling heavy as lead in the cavity of his chest. He didn't even notice Doctor Mahealani and his assistant exiting the room, his senses and focus were completely honed onto the AI. He couldn't have looked away if he tried. A thousand thoughts and emotions ran through his mind, things he desperately wished he could have told Stiles before those fateful days on Zeta, feelings he'd discovered in the quiet loneliness of his barrack room without him.  
  
"You're alive," is what he blurted out instead, immediately regretting opening his mouth and, not for the first time, wondering if Stiles' lack of brain-to-mouth filter was infectious.  
  
"Before, I would have said that I was partially alive. Just a very clever program composed of complex algorithms and a set personality framework," Stiles responded, tucking his hands into the pocket of his loose pants. A bizarre thought occurred to Derek that this was the first time he'd ever seen Stiles wear actual clothes. Not that his AI hologram had been naked, but this was absurd in its normalcy. "But now that I'm here, I guess you could say that I am. Alive, that is," he smiled again, scuffing the floor with the ball of his foot, clad in simple slip-ons.  
  
The action was so casual, so completely human that Derek was overcome with the sudden and overwhelming urge to rush forward and envelop Stiles in his arms, to bury his nose against the junction of his neck and shoulder and breathe him in, to run his hands up and down Stiles' lean-corded arms and scent-mark him, intermingle their scents until he was marked as Pack, unable to distinguish where he ended and the other began. But, as he was, he felt unable to take even the smallest step forward.  
  
Stiles, of course, picked up on his turbulent emotions, his indecision to close the distance between them. He shuffled forward a step, and then another. They were still feet apart, but now the distance felt less insurmountable, more tangible. “I didn’t mean to make you worry so much about me,” he mumbled, the easy smile faltering, sliding off his face in increments. “I just wanted to get you out of the base. I wanted to keep you safe.”

“I thought you’d died,” Derek choked out, stumbling forward a step. “You wouldn’t switch on. Doctor Mahealani couldn’t get you operational. You’d wasted so much energy and then you were Overclocked and I just –” His hands floundered, unsure as to what he could do with them when there were so many things he wanted to do, places on Stiles where he wanted to rest his palms and fingers against and feel his physical form beneath them. “I thought you were dead,” he finished lamely, his voice low and quiet.

“Hey,” Stiles murmured, closing the distance fully and clasping Derek’s hand. The touch felt like a bolt of electricity shot up Derek’s arm, despite no presence of energy.  “None of my power was wasted if it was for you, Derek. None of it. You should know that, you should _know_ how much I care about you.”

Stiles had always possessed a charming quality about him. Even the way he’d been an insufferable brat had had a certain level of charisma that, after enough time spent in his presence, was almost impossible to feel anything less than exasperated fondness. But up close, hardly a foot apart, Derek found that he could not look away from the other’s face. He wasn’t going to lie to himself by saying that he’d never found Stiles attractive, even in his holographic form, because, well… he _had_. Stiles hadn't liked his physique, but Derek’s eyes had lingered on the breadth of his shoulders, the narrowness of his slim waist and, more than once, idly wondered what he’d feel like in a physical body, pressed close against him. He’d never let himself imagine what Stiles could be like as a human, but up close, he was nothing short of _enchanting_. His skin was pale, dotted with constellations of moles that on anybody else could be called blemishes, but on Stiles made him imperfectly flawless. His hair was soft-looking and a chocolate brown, but it was his eyes that entranced him. Dimly, somewhere in the back of his mind, he’d anticipated Stiles’ eyes to be blue, like his hologram. He didn’t know what he’d expected, but the warm amber colour framed by dark, long lashes certainly hadn't been it. And with Stiles looking at him so earnestly, his gaze liquid and impassioned, Derek knew for sure that he was ruined for anybody else.

 _Fuck_ , he thought hazily, staring at their clasped hands and running his thumb dazedly over Stiles’ knuckles, his long, graceful fingers. He was in love with Stiles.

“I’ve been wanting to touch you for ages now,” Stiles mumbled, staring at their hands and his lips ( _fuck_ , his plump, stupidly pink lips) curled into a small, sweet smile.

“Is it what you were hoping for?” Derek asked, strangely nervous.

“No,” Stiles grinned, wide and ecstatic. “It’s much, much better than anything I’d hoped for. I think out of all the perceptions and senses I’ve been lucky enough to experience in my short time alive, this one…” He let out a little laugh, rapturous, his eyes shiny and wet, and a moment later Derek had an armful of Stiles, clutching the back of his tank top in his fists. Derek immediately wrapped his arms around Stiles’ shoulders, burying his nose under the hinge of Stiles’ jaw and breathing him in, exhaling wetly and shakily. He was warm under the layers of cloth, his back muscles shifting with the movement of his lungs expanding, breathing and _alive_.

“Oh yeah,” Stiles choked out, the vibration of his vocal chords thrumming against Derek’s skin, lighting him up from the inside. “This one is definitely the best.”

 

 

Stiles was offered a room to bunk in around the corner from Derek in the communal barracks, but Derek wouldn’t hear of it, profoundly hating the idea of being needlessly separated. His small room was outfitted with a bunk bed, which Stiles got entirely too enthusiastic about, especially after shotgunning the top bunk (not that Derek really cared).

Their first night sleeping in the same room was interesting. Stiles was still excited about the novelty of sleeping, and, coupled with the enormous sundae he’d consumed at dinner that had every square inch _covered_ in chocolate sauce and sugary candies, he was buzzing like the world’s most excitable fly.

“It’s so _weird_ , how people sleep, you know?” he mused, peering at Derek below from over the lip of his mattress. “I mean, I understand the physical and physiological need for rest, to allow the body some time for recuperation. Oh, hey, did you know that seventeen hours of sustained wakefulness leads to a decrease in performance equivalent to a blood alcohol-level of 0.05%? No wonder you were going so loopy after staying awake so long in Zeta.”

“That’s fascinating, considering I was trying to stay conscious enough to get our asses out of there,” Derek deadpanned, arms folded beneath his head and looking up at Stiles, feeling oddly content despite his hard, uncomfortable military mattress and his little cramped room that, no matter how many years he spent inhabiting it, never quite felt or smelled like home.

“Okay, big guy, I know that you’re not interested in my trivia, even though I’m a veritable fountain of knowledge. But yeah, I mean, it’s like… humans go on standby for multiple hours to recharge their batteries, and even then most of the time they have weird hallucinations."  
  
"You're talking about dreaming, right?" Derek asked.  
  
“Yeah. As the dictionary defines it, dreaming is the successions of images, ideas, emotions, and sensations that occur involuntarily in the mind during certain stages of sleep. Did you know that you can have four to seven dreams a night?”

“Huh,” he said, pursing his lips and nodding minutely. Out of curiosity, he asked “Do you dream?”  
  
Stiles got this funny look on his face, and Derek immediately felt like a jerk who had overstepped his bounds. “Sorry,” he blurted, “I didn’t mean to ask something that makes you uncomfortable.” Internally, he felt like kicking himself, for reminding Stiles that he wasn’t actually human, just a simulation of one.

“Oh, nah, man, it’s cool,” Stiles waved offhandedly, retreating back onto his mattress and out of Derek’s sight. “I’ve only been human for a handful of days anyway, it’s still pretty trippy learning how to pee and blow my nose and sweat. Humans are weird and gross.”

“Not that gross,” Derek chuckled, a little sad that their conversation had ended. Bidding each other goodnight, he switched off the lights and shuffled down into his blanket, punching his pillow a few times to try and fluff it into some semblance of softness.

“For what it’s worth,” Stiles murmured quietly in the dark, after such a long silence between them that Derek assumed he had fallen asleep, “I have dreamt before. Only once, though, and not for long.”

“Yeah?” Derek breathed, so quiet that he wasn’t sure if Stiles even heard it.

“Yeah,” Stiles whispered back. As though the dark around them bestowed a sense of security, in which they could express themselves without fear or judgement. “I didn’t know what it was. It was kind of scary, dreaming when you’ve never done it before. It was about you.”

Surprised, Derek cast around for something to say, but only managed to reply with a simple “Oh.” He scratched his arm, if only to give him a second to think of something more articulate to say. “Sometimes dreams are scary,” Derek admitted, folding his hands together. “I get dreams about the fights I’ve been in, except they go bad. Nightmares.”

“What do you do if you get nightmares?” Stiles asked, his voice small

“I didn’t do anything for a while,” he replied truthfully, feeling more courageous in the dark. “ARGUS makes all its Nauts go to counselling after conflict to try and keep out mental health optimum, so I had someone to talk to about my flashbacks. If the nightmares get really bad, or they’re more personal than I feel like sharing with my counsellor, I tell Laura. When I was a kid and I got frightened during the night, she’d let me sleep in her bed with her.”

“That’s really cute,” Stiles replied, and Derek could _hear_ the grin in his voice. “I’m imagining you as a little kid, climbing into Laura’s bed and crying.”

“What makes you think I was a kid? This could have been last year for all you know,” Derek answered with a straight face, trying not to let amusement colour his words. Stiles let out an inelegant snort, and Derek responded with a private smirk of his own at the other’s laughter.

“So if I get nightmares, can I talk to you about them?” Stiles asked, after a good long while of wheezing laughter.

“Of course. You can talk to me about them anytime.”

“Even if they’re really stupid dreams? Like being chased by giant vampire pudding-cups?”

“Even if they’re really stupid,” Derek replied.

“Good. I’m going to hold you to that.”

Derek listened to the unfamiliar sound of someone in his room, inhabiting the same living space as him after so long on his own, but he realised that it wasn’t such a bad thing after all. Stiles’ rhythmic breathing and steady heartbeat soon lulled him into a content sleep, one of the best he’d had in a long, long time.

 

 

Having Stiles in a human body required some drastic changes to Derek's lifestyle. First and foremost, he had to meet Laura and Peter again now that he had a physical form, which somehow seemed to make things simultaneously easier and more embarrassing all at once. Derek had touched Stiles since their first embrace in Danny's lab, but they had been casual, fleeting points of contact, as if he was still suspended in disbelief that Stiles was real. He found himself carefully monitoring how much physical interaction he had with the other young man, being cautious that the hand on his lower back only stayed there for so long, because he knew that if his hands lingered for too long, he wouldn't be able to stop himself from wanting to touch more, take more.  
  
Laura, however, seemed to have to no problem in treating him like an adoptive little brother. She ruffled his hair playfully and bumped shoulders with him at the table in the cafeteria, while Peter clapped him warmly on the shoulder in passing. Derek shouldn't have felt jealousy from those simple acts of scent-marking, but part of him seethed that Stiles was beginning to smell of other people, when really, all he wanted was for him to smell only of Derek and himself and _DerekandStiles_. It might have been a selfish wish, even considering that Laura and Peter were only taking the extra care to include Stiles into their Pack, but Derek felt that maybe, after so long, he could afford to feel a little self-regarding about someone.  
  
Excited by his newfound sense of taste, Stiles set about trying to sample as many different foods as possible in order to broaden the horizon of his newly-acquired palette. He seemed to have a fondness for the overly-enhanced flavoured snacks and junk foods that someone human of his age would have binged on frequently, almost mimicking the eating habits of a young college student to perfection. However, his extensive research into the human body and their dietary requirements also led him to seek healthy food options like salads, and the occasional substitutes like tofu and turkey. This jarring change from one food group to another was almost comical to watch, however much Stiles complained after getting his very first stomach ache, having tried to take Laura up on a bet to see who could eat the most loaded potato skins in one sitting. Stiles had put everything he had into that valiant effort, even if it was no match for Laura's infamous black-hole of a stomach. Derek had sat by his cot and handed him painkillers and antacids when Stiles had been convinced he was dying ("It's too soon for me to die, Derek! I'm too young and pretty!") and made appropriately-timed noises of sympathy when each complaint was moaned painfully.

 

  
  
It seemed that Stiles' human shell was such a novelty to everyone that even Laura and Peter seemed to be affected.  
  
"Oh my gosh, you'll never guess what happened today!" Stiles had cried during one evening while they sat in each other's company in the rec hall, his hands flapping animatedly with excitement.  
  
"You already told us about the time you pooped," Peter reminded him from behind one of his books, "I've already given you [one of those stickers](http://rlv.zcache.com.au/i_pooped_today_sticker-rb6aba3052d774ec88a210ed6fdbf84b3_v9wth_8byvr_324.jpg) to commemorate the occasion, that should be enough."  
  
"I don't think I want to know if it's got to do with any more bodily fluids being expelled," Laura added, swiping the brush of her nail polish cleanly over her big toe in one precise swoop, "but Derek would probably be interested. Wouldn't you, Der?" She grinned wickedly at him and Derek felt the tips of his ears turn hot. He flipped her off, mostly out of reflex, but also because he didn't want to seem suspiciously interested in the topic at hand (spoiler alert: he was _very_ interested in the topic of whether or not Stiles could function _fully_ as a human, and may or may not have spent a little longer in the shower that very morning thinking about it).  
  
"No, no, look! I got a paper cut from one of the pages in the book I was reading, and I bled!" Stiles proudly held his index finger up, displaying a stark red line across the pad of his finger.

Derek leapt out of his chair, covering the distance between them in two long strides as he took Stiles' hand between his own, panicking. He hadn't smelled any blood, hadn't noticed anything amiss from him, no sign of pain. Subjectively, he knew that he was getting too worked up, especially over something as trivial and banal as a paper-cut, but his Lycan instincts were all about keeping Stiles safe and free of illness and injury, and after the debacle with Zeta Base, well, he figured it'd probably take him a while to stop feeling so overprotective. As ridiculous as the situation seemed to be, it didn’t stop him from examining every millimetre of his fingertip with careful eyes, even though he could practically _feel_ Laura’s eyeroll.

“For goodness’ sake, Der, it’s not even bad enough to warrant anything worse than a Band-Aid,” she grumbled, “It’s not like his freaking finger’s gonna develop gangrene and fall off from a tiny scratch like that.”

“She’s right, the only reason why they hurt so much is because fingertips and hands contain significantly more nociceptors per square millimetre than most of the rest of a human's body, and the microscopic damage done by paper's edge is nearer to the surface, where the more sensitive nerves reside and have very low pain thresholds to trigger, not to mention the fact paper cuts don't bleed much and this leaves the nerves open to air and other irritants, causing them to continue being in an activated state for much longer than more significant cuts,” Stiles babbled quickly, staring at the hands clasped between their bodies. Derek’s attention was dragged away from the simple cut because of the sheer _breathlessness_ of Stiles’ voice, looking at the other’s face who was, strangely enough, suffused with a blush over his cheeks and down his neck, his eyes large and shining. Derek felt a hard lump settle in his throat, because being so close afforded him the unique scent of Stiles that he’d begun to develop during the few days out of Danny’s lab. He smelled like human sweat and skin, a little like honeyed milk and the complex array of odours that made up the sense of emotions that his Lycan senses picked up on. And over all of that was the smell of Derek’s living space and own scent, from touches and inhabiting the same space, laid over the top of it all like a sheer veil, marking him as Pack, as _Derek’s_.

“Oh, _barf_ ,” Laura mimed a gagging noise, snapping Derek out of his reverie enough to realise that he’d stepped closer still, just inches away from Stiles and that the low, contented rumbling noise was coming from _him_. “Ugh, keep it in your pants, baby bro, or at least behind closed doors. I love you, but it’s my duty as a sibling to find any and all public displays of affection between you and someone else just kinda gross.”

“The worst,” he muttered as Stiles stepped back quickly, slipping his long fingers out of Derek’s and tucking his hands into the pockets of his hoodie, looking down at the floor like it was the most interesting thing in this world. He felt like an idiot because his face felt hot, and he wouldn’t have cared usually but Laura was just being a jerk about the situation as a whole. “You are the absolute worst,” he pointed accusingly to her, definitely _not_ watching Stiles’ face out of the corner of his eye and feeling stupidly captivated by his flush.

 

 

Derek couldn’t chalk it up to the fact that he's been busy with electronic paperwork for his upcoming retirement that he hadn't had time to spend alone with Stiles. They still slept in the same room at night, obviously, and saw each other during the day. But Stiles was still having sessions with Mahealani and Deaton to iron out the last few bugs in his software, and to monitor his chip's condition now that it was downgraded to a regular AI. Most of Stiles' ability was still intact, but now his processing power seemed slower, less frantic. He still babbled when he got excited (and lately, everything on the human spectrum seemed to excite him), but Danny assured them that he was in no danger of Overclocking soon – he was just too enthusiastic about having an actual physical mouth that his words came out faster than he could enunciate them properly.

Derek spoke to his parents when Stiles was at one of his early maintenance appointments (getting some hinge or other checked for durability). They already knew most of the story of what had occurred on Zeta Base from Laura and Peter, but he retold it from his point of view and answered any questions they might've had. It was a brief and not altogether unwelcome break from his form-filling, even if his mother seemed to be a little too interested in Stiles.

"So you technically own him, then?" she asked, her well-groomed dark brows raised.

"If we're talking technicalities, then yes, I suppose I do," Derek replied, leaning his elbows on either side of the harmless-looking tablet that stored a veritable mountain of paperwork, the light of the video projection casting his room in a diffused glow. "But Stiles is..."

"Special?" His father prompted, smiling gently.

"When Laura brought it up, he said he was, and I quote, a _'strong independent AI who don't need no man’_.”

“He certainly sounds like quite a character,” his father hid a smile behind his hand.

“He’s something, alright,” Derek grumbled, but it came out fonder than anything, which he immediately regretted when his mother’s eyes grew as sharp as her grin.

“ _Well_ ,” she hummed thoughtfully, tapping her chin with a fingertip, “We’d planned to set up the spare room for him when the four of you came back-”

“Mom, no,” he groaned.

“– but it looks like maybe your father and I will just switch the beds from your room and the spare room so you have the bigger one –”

“ _Moooom_ ,” Derek whined, covering his face with both hands and feeling all of thirteen years old again. How did his parents always manage that?

“Talia, look, he’s not even denying it,” his father guffawed gleefully. The door to the room opened with a soft noise, and Derek hurriedly slammed his palm across the surface of the tablet, ending the call suddenly (though not before his mother and father managed to get in one last cackle). Derek twisted in his seat, blinking at Stiles’ silhouette stark against the light from outside the door. He quickly glanced at the LED numbers of his clock, surprised to see that it was quite late in the evening. He’d been so occupied with his administrative work and the brief call to his parents that he hadn't noticed how long he’d been sitting at his desk and filling out the digital forms on his tablet. The awkward crick in his lower back and the loud gurgling from his stomach confirmed that he’d spent the better part of the evening hunched over his tablet trying to get his forms in order.

“Oh, sorry, dude,” Stiles said quickly, “I didn’t know you were in a call. I can come back later.” He gestured behind him vaguely, pointing at the brightly lit corridor outside with both hands as though he were still figuring out how to gesticulate properly.

“No, it’s fine,” Derek replied, “I just finished the call anyway.” He forcefully dragged his eyes away from the wide span of Stiles’ shoulders, contrasted all the more by the outline of his slim hips. With each day that passed, he was finding it increasingly difficult to resist touching Stiles in an intimate manner, giving in to his primal instincts and press their bodies together, as clichéd as it sounded, until neither of them knew where one ended and the other began. But it was an impulse that he was desperate to resist, to give himself the illusion that he could, at the very least, to be a semi-decent person. He _knew_ Stiles cared about him, but whether the feelings were of a romantic nature or of something more platonic, he couldn’t be sure. But he didn’t want to push Stiles into something he didn’t feel, or something he could have misconstrued as feelings when he didn’t, in fact, have them.

Stiles walked over to him, the harsh light of the outside corridor gone the moment he’d stepped outside the doorway’s proximity sensor and it shirred shut again. The muted light of the desk lamp cast his face into soft planes, making his skin look almost translucently pale in contrast to his dark moles. He was wearing his military-issue khakis and boots, but Derek’s shirt instead of his own. It sat well on his shoulders, but hung loosely everywhere else and enveloped him in their shared scent like an embrace. It made Derek’s chest lurch violently with a ferocious _want_ , and, despising himself keenly for it, he turned back to his desk and continued scrawling his information on the required forms. If he buried himself up to the elbows in work, he wouldn’t be able to bury his hands in Stiles’ hair, or tug the other’s clothes off him and devour him whole.

That was his reasoning, and he was sticking to it.

“You didn’t come to the cafeteria for dinner,” Stiles commented, turning his back to the wall and leaning his backside against the edge of the table beside Derek. “Laura and Peter wanted to talk to you about sharing storage boxes for when ARGUS docks back on Earth soon, see if you wanted to pack your stuff in their moving cartons or divide the load.”

“I don’t have much stuff,” he answered, focusing too hard on the barely-perceptible scratch of his stylus against the screen instead of the melodic, slightly too-fast beat of Stiles’ heart. Especially when standing so close to him.

“I can see that,” Stiles chuckled, glancing around the almost Spartan room. “Not long to go until ARGUS heads back to Earth, right?”

“A little over a month,” Derek ticked another box on the form with a short jab of the stylus. “Never knew there was so much paperwork you had to fill in when you were finishing work.”

“It looks awful,” Stiles commiserated, frowning. “It’s pretty late – are you going to pack it in for the night?”

“I’m on a roll at the moment. I just need to finish these last four pages and then that’s one less form to write out.”

“You’re going to get the worst Repetitive Strain Injury in your wrist if you don’t take a break from it occasionally,” Stiles frowned, “Lycan healing abilities or not, it’s still not healthy to pretzel yourself up over work for such an extended period of time.” He pulled an apple from the pocket of his trousers and buffed it on his shirt, acting out a move he must have ripped off those old-fashioned films as he flicked his arm out in an oddly graceful move, bouncing the fruit off his forearm. Derek caught it deftly in the hand that wasn’t holding the digital pen, smiling tiredly as he took a bite out of it. It was crunchy and sweet on his tongue, exactly how he liked his apples (unlike his heathen of a sister, who enjoyed the waxy ones that tasted like ass).

“I can manage a couple more hours of pretzeling,” he mumbled through his apple. It was by sheer chance that he swallowed his mouthful, because a moment later Stiles’ long, slender fingers traced over his forearm, coming to rest at the bone just under his wrist. Everything else fell away at once, all of Derek’s senses honing into the two of them, Stiles’ heartbeat, his contented, slightly-sleepy scent and the soft drag of his thumb across Derek’s knuckle.

“Just take it easy, wolfman,” Stiles said softly.

“Yeah,” he rasped, feeling his heart lodge in his chest (or maybe the mouthful of apple that he mightn’t have chewed thoroughly enough). Stiles smiled at him, and then placed the palm of his hand on the back of Derek’s neck briefly, giving the smallest of squeezes. It was a stupidly familiar move that Laura and Peter did to him almost daily, that his family all did to each other, a Pack action that reaffirmed connection and marking. Derek leaned into the touch before he was even conscious of doing it, and then a second later the moment had ended, Stiles picking up his pyjamas from his bed and heading to the tiny bathroom to shower before bed.

Derek very deliberately waited until the door closed and he heard water running before faceplanting on his arms, letting out a soft, frustrated groan. The touches had felt so natural, so _good_ and welcoming and his inner wolf was whining with the loss of contact from someone that was supposed to be his life partner, his _mate_.

“I’m so fucked,” he muttered out loud, feeling his resolve fraying to pieces.

 

 

Stiles had never really been one to deny any sort of human interaction, considering the sheer velocity of his speech when prompted on whichever subject he felt strongly about (hint: almost all of them, if his verbal diarrhoea was anything to go by). His need for human touch was only exacerbated by acquiring his android body, and more than once he was reprimanded by security for excessive disruptive noise when he and Laura were in the middle of a savage tickling war. He clapped people on the back and nudged at shoulders, even accepting Peter's hair ruffling every so often with a kind of resigned enjoyment (because Peter was Peter, and sometimes even him standing motionless was aggravating).

Derek hadn't thought much about that night where Stiles had, possibly unknowingly, scent-marked him. Except for the fact that it was a total lie because he _had_ thought about it, and quite a lot, too. He'd very much burned that memory into his brain over the course of two showers that had made him feel like the worst possible being in the known galaxy, for using the image of his friend, his _Packmate_ , as masturbatory fodder. Even if it hadn’t been a mate thing, the image of Stiles’ sweet, soft mouth, his long fingers, well, that just _did_ things to him that he had to be very careful about thinking of at all times. More than once he’d gotten lost in daydreams, and there was only so much of Laura’s smug side-eyeing he could take.

Stiles had an appointment with the lab every couple of days to check his vitals before their re-entry back to Earth, to update his android hardware and iron out any bugs his newly-acquired body seemed to have. Derek couldn't help but feel that, each time he returned from his hours-long maintenance appointments, he was that little bit more human. His scent seemed to mellow out, become something more definite and tangible, as if it were finally comfortable with the fact that the human parts of its structure were there to stay.

He knew there was no going back when the tell-tale signs started. Stiles wouldn't be around for most of a day, no contact between them whatsoever, and Laura would point out (grinning her mischievous grin) that he was pissier than usual. He instinctively sought out Stiles in any room he entered, either by sight or smell, even though he _knew_ Stiles wouldn't be in it. And above all, Stiles continued the casual physical contact between them, and Derek – well, he unashamedly leaned into those hands, prolonged their touching shoulders or knees pressing against each other under their lunch table. It was getting to a point where Derek wasn't so sure he could continue his everyday life without Stiles in it, which posed a moral dilemma for him. On paper, Stiles was technically 'his property', being a cybernetic organism. But he was so irrefutably, undeniably human that, most times, Derek couldn't think about owning him without a heavy brick of guilt sitting at the bottom of his gut. Stiles was a brilliant, independently-thinking being, full of vibrancy and sarcasm and dry wit, it was impossible to think of him as a manufactured pile of bio-cybertronics. Because Stiles _was_ human. He ate weird foods in far-too-large quantities to assess their taste and complained of stomach aches. He loved sleeping in and feeling warm under the covers when Derek had the cooling system in their room up too high. He howled in pain when he stubbed a toe, bled when cut, bruised when bumping into things. He ate and went to the bathroom and sometimes snored when he tried staying up too late and was overly tired.

Basically, he was annoying and loud-mouthed, whiny and unbearably loyal and pretty much everything Derek ever wanted in a mate.

With T-minus three weeks until their return, Derek was suddenly startled awake in the middle of the night by a cold, gripping feeling of dread and panic. It took a few moments of him blinking up at the bed slats overhead in the darkness to realize that it was Stiles’ ragged breathing coming from above, and not his own.

“Stiles?” he murmured, honing his sharp hearing abilities to take in every minute sound. “You awake?”

“Yeah,” came the breathy voice, tight with panic.

“You okay?”

“I… Uh. I don’t know?” Stiles answered. His heartbeat was rabbit-fast, and his breathing was still uneven, as though he’d been trying for a few minutes to get it back to normal.

“You wanna come down here?” Derek asked, and no sooner were the words out of his mouth than Stiles was scrambling awkwardly down the ladder of the bunk, legs gangly and inelegant from his slumber. He stood awkwardly at the side of Derek’s mattress, chewing on his bottom lip and worrying the fabric of his sleep shirt with his fingers until Derek patted the edge of his bed with a hand. With a grateful expression, Stiles folded himself under the edge of the metal bunk frame and perched on the side of the bed, picking at a corner of the blanket restlessly.

“Remember when you said that I could talk to you about nightmares if I have them, even if they were really stupid ones?”

“Did you have a nightmare?” Derek asked, sitting up a little and leaning back against his pillow.

Stiles sighed, jiggling his knee up and down nervously. “Not really?” he mumbled, clasping his hands together in his lap and looking down at them. “I think I’m just feeling kinda anxious? Sort of like – I used to have this enormous ability, you know? Like, Military AIs, they have these _huge_ processing powers, like wow, you don’t even know. I mean, you saw what they’re capable of. What _I_ was capable of. Even on Zeta.” He flung his hands upwards in a frustrated gesture, as though he could fully encompass all he was feeling in a movement of his limbs. “I feel too big for this skin. Like I’ve been shrunk into a too-small receptacle and I’m still trying to find a way to get comfortable. In this human body, I kind of feel like I’m – I don’t even know how to describe it. It’s like I used to be this crazily-useful Artificial Intelligence unit with almost limitless processing capabilities and the ability to solve almost any problem within milliseconds. And now…” He shook his head, shoulders slumping into a dejected line. “I’m just feeling like, with my downgrade, I’m not as useful as I’d been before. I can still process information, but with most of my facilities removed, I’m not much better than a really smart, average human guy.”

Derek could understand a little of what Stiles was feeling. When he was forced to hold his Lycan abilities back on group missions, he felt like only half a person. He couldn’t, however, pretend to feel the full scope of what the former AI could, of being permanently reduced to a less powerful being. “Do you regret it?” he asked, “Becoming human, I mean.”

“Oh, no, definitely not,” Stiles replied quickly, “Eating is awesome, and Scott was right about pooping. I just feel like, I dunno,” he shrugged limply, “I sort of wanted to keep being useful to you. Now I’m not much better than a talking calculator.”

“Hey,” Derek slapped at his arm softly, “Don’t say that. You’re plenty useful. And besides, we’re heading to Earth in three weeks; you won’t _need_ to be as useful as a Military-grade AI when we’re both retired from the force.”

“It frustrates me when you make more sense than I do,” Stiles grinned back, the worry lines on his brow smoothened out. Derek smiled back, even as the skin on the back of his hand tingled warmly where Stiles was drawing loose circles on his knuckles with a fingertip. Stiles seemed to catch himself doing it, and self-consciously withdrew his hand, folding it in his lap again.

“S’pretty late,” he mumbled, glancing across the room at the glowing LED display of the alarm clock. It was just after two in the morning. “I should probably let you get some sleep.”

“Are you going to be alright?” Derek asked.

“Yeah. No. I don’t really know, just having a weird night, I think. Do you ever get those times where you think too much and you can’t stop thinking?”

“Sometimes,” he replied, folding down the edge of his blanket before he could listen to the logical part of his brain telling him it was a Very Bad Idea. “You get those sometimes – all part of being human, I guess.”

Stiles looked at him. Their gazes locked and all playfulness suddenly evaporated from the air. As well as Derek could see in the dark, he wished he could fully make out the complex emotion on the other’s face. Seconds stretched out, long and silent, and he was just about to fold the edge of the blanket back up and laugh it off as a joke (while planning to spend the next half hour or so mentally berating himself) when Stiles shifted off his perch on the edge of the bed. In a few hesitant movements, he sidled up the mattress and folded his legs under the blanket, pulling it up over his shoulders and settling down on the pillow. The cot wasn’t particularly big compared to Derek’s bulky frame, and Stiles, for all he was slender, wasn’t small either, and so it felt a little cramped. But Derek felt his mouth go dry and his own heartbeat pick up at having Stiles at such close proximity. To date it was the closest they’d ever been to each other, and he could feel the heat from Stiles’ body and the scent from his skin more than ever before.

“Sorry in advance if I kick you while I’m sleeping,” Stiles smiled nervously, folding an arm under the pillow and turning to his other side.

“I’ll just kick you out, then,” Derek deadpanned in return, turning to face the other wall with his back to Stiles, even though it wasn’t his preferred side. Despite his earlier anxiety, Stiles’ breathing evened out into regular sleeping rhythm only minutes later, and Derek followed soon after, trying to not enjoy the presence of someone sleeping beside him.

 

 

It wasn’t a one-time thing. Stiles seemed to take that night as an unspoken invitation to slip into Derek’s bunk bed whenever he wanted.

“I’m pretty sure you’re not a five year-old child that needs coddling,” Derek grunted, letting out an ‘ _oof!_ ’ of pain when one of Stiles’ knees caught him in the belly as he squirmed under the covers.

“I’m pretty sure you weren’t complaining like a little bitch last time we did this, dude,” Stiles said, fluffing the pillow and happily plonking himself down on it. “In fact I distinctly remember you were snoring a little bit through the night when I went to get a drink of water, and you don’t usually snore unless you’re _really_ deeply asleep.”

“I don’t snore,” Derek retorted.

“Uh, yeah, you do.” Stiles looked at him with his big, liquid brown eyes, amusement written all over his face. “How long do you think I've been around you? I wasn't exactly sleeping myself when I was an AI - I got bored, tracked your REMs. You only snore when you're totally, one-hundred-and-ten percent relaxed and in slow-wave sleep, and your delta activity is around fifty percent. I know one-hundred-and-ten is statistically impossible, by the way, but I was, as humans call it, exaggerating to make a point. Now, we _could_ go to sleep, or I can talk about our good friends, acetylcholine, norepinephrine, serotonin, histamine, and orexin, the neurotransmitters involved in sleep and waking patterns, until you pass out.”

And Derek, despite his complaints, well, he didn’t _mind_ Stiles sharing his bed. He felt comfortable and safe, feelings that he usually didn’t feel unless he was tucked up in his own bed at home. Stiles smelled of everything good – like Pack and Mate, of too many Doritos and old paper because he’d somehow become _obsessed_ with printed literature, the texture of paper between the pads of his fingers and the sweet scent of chemical degradation vanillin. He was a voracious reader, borrowing as many books from the library on board as they would allow from their limited stock, rising stacks of novels and paperbacks littering their cramped room. Despite the easy availability of books on a tablet eReader, Stiles was adamantly insistent on using real books when he could, treating the dog-eared pages with reverence. He didn’t smell yet of things from Earth, having been contained for the entirety of his human existence on a sterile spaceship, but Derek had no doubt that he would easily pick up the smells of fresh air and trees.

What _really_ weighed heavily on Derek’s mind, though, wasn’t the sharing-bed-part, but what came after. Stiles seemed to love sleeping in, and with his years of military training and service, Derek’s body clock usually worked better than his alarms, so often he was awake before Stiles. Sometimes a few minutes, at other times (like recently) for a good half hour, when he decided to switch his alarm off and lie there. Stiles, still deeply asleep, no longer with his back towards him, but spread out over the mattress like a starfish, more often than not lying on some part of Derek. And he felt like an outright _jerk_ , because their legs would be tangled together and Stiles’ face mashed unattractively against his shoulder or chest, wound around him like a gangly bipedal octopus and smelling of morning cosiness and slightly stale breath and Derek _wanted_. He has spent far too many agonisingly-silent minutes staring at the bed slats above him in despair, because Stiles was warm and pliant beside him, draped over his body and breathing slowly against his neck, and he hadn’t remembered waking up with such intense morning wood since he was a teenager and had the double-whammy of owning both his own tree house and a secret stash of Playboys. Having the other so close to him, in such an intimate setting, made it indescribably difficult for him not to listen to his instincts, his _desires_ , and just take what he wanted. More than once, in the privacy of the shower (his best friend in these dire times of need), he’d imagined rolling on top of Stiles, pinning him down against the mattress and kissing him, slowly and deeply and hungrily. He fantasised about Stiles’ responsiveness, the sounds he might make when Derek slotted himself between those gangly legs, pressed their bodies together and rocked their hips against one another’s, coaxing out melodic gasps and whines. He wanted to devour him, to touch his body all over and feel him, to fill his lithe, surprisingly strong body again and again.

But it could never happen, because Stiles simply didn’t feel that way. Or perhaps he couldn’t, because not once had Derek been able to smell desire on him. Base emotions, yes, when Stiles was happy or irritated or hurt, but never once had he caught a whiff of arousal. And once, shortly before Stiles woke up, Derek had shifted his legs to ease a cramp and had accidentally brushed against the other’s crotch ( _completely_ and _utterly_ by accident, and he felt like dirt afterwards because it hadn’t been consensual on Stiles’ part and he’d been extra nice and gotten him two chocolate pudding cups with his dinner). Stiles had been entirely soft – no activity whatsoever, despite being a young, healthy male who was half-clothed, relaxed, and twined around a subjectively good-looking man in his sleep.

Derek hadn’t tried to assume things, but the signals were there – that Stiles, as close as they were, didn’t see him as a romantic interest, or even worse, that he _couldn’t_ , because his programming made him asexual.

“You know there’s nothing wrong with being asexual, you dork,” Laura chided at him when they next spoke, wheedling Derek’s worry from him, “our own _brother_ is ace, and you love him to bits. You _dote_ on him. You know you don’t really feel like that.”

“I know that,” Derek sighed, stirring hi mostly-cold coffee, “I just… I’m disappointed, I think.”

“Because he was someone you felt more strongly for than anybody else? Because you love him, and it’s disappointing for that not to be returned?”

“Yeah,” he grimaced, beyond caring that his stupid, gigantic mountain of affection towards his partner was blindingly obvious to everyone else.

“It’s okay,” Laura sighed, scooping him up into her arms for a hug, even if Derek’s shoulders were much wider than hers and it was a difficult position to hold. “Well, I mean, it’s not _okay_ okay. I just… You’ve never really let yourself have anything before, and it makes me unhappy that, the one time you’ve openly allowed yourself to want something, it’s not going to happen.”

“Not much I can do about it,” he sighed against her shoulder. “I don’t even know if he _is_ asexual. He seems to be aromantic, at least for the moment, but his personality’s pretty much mostly been finalised with Mahealani.”

“Would you feel better without spending time around him?”

“No!” He drew back, eyes wide and mouth set in a grim, unhappy line. “I don’t care if he doesn’t… I mean, I _do_ , but I want to still be with him, even if he doesn’t feel like that. I want him to be happy.” He looked down at his cold coffee and smiled, somewhat wistfully. “Even if he doesn’t love me back, he’s my mate. I can live without sex, or romantic attraction, as long as I can be around him. I want him happy.”

“You’re such a goober,” Laura smiled sadly, leaning her head on his shoulder.

 

 

Nothing unusual marked the day of Stiles' final checkup. Aside from the regular annual maintenance check (equated to a doctor's visit for humans), he would be fully updated. Derek was assigned an engineer in the town over to his, only a couple of hours' drive away, that he could take Stiles to for his check once they returned to Earth, and the paperwork for inputting his details into their system was complete, and in process.

There seemed to be nothing amiss in the lead up to the appointment, and Derek spent those last couple of hours finalising his checklists of things to pack. With just under two weeks before they disembarked, it felt like the end of a long, exhausting journey. He still couldn't believe that he'd even been _considering_ extending his military service, but then again, he'd never really had much of a purpose for living back on Earth. He supposed that Stiles' thirst for seeing his home planet had influenced the decision somewhat.

When Stiles returned from the appointment, Derek could immediately sense something had changed about him. He seemed much more fidgety than usual, his body temperature seemed far more elevated than usual, and his attention span seemed non-existent.

“Is everything okay?” he asked, because after personally experiencing an Overclocking, he wasn’t going to take any chances with Stiles without asking about his state of being.

“Whahuh? Oh, yeah, I’m fine,” Stiles replied, somewhat distracted as he fiddled with the pages of a paperback stacked on the desk, one of many that had been steadily accumulating into small turrets and, in all likelihood, hoarded the entirety of the books in the small on-board library. Derek didn’t detect any hint of a lie, and yet he couldn’t shake off the ominous feeling he was getting.

“Everything go alright with your final appointment with Mahealani?”

“Oh, yeah,” Stiles nodded, abandoning the book to tap a staccato rhythm against his knee. “Everything’s all good now. Updated all the server technological-y stuff. All good to go. Ready for cruisin’ for a bruisin’, heh.” He punctuated the tacky catchphrase with what appeared to be the world’s lamest thumbs-up.

There was a… strange smell coming from Stiles, one he hadn’t sensed before. But he’d been taught growing up by his mother that it was rude to just _say_ that to people – the last time he’d told his teenage cousin that her nail polish made her smell gross, he’d been clapped upside the head by his grandma with a shoe (the lesson had been learnt quickly – she’d worn wooden-soled clogs). Whatever was bugging Stiles didn’t seem to have any adverse effect on him, or be causing him any pain or discomfort. Perhaps, he wondered to himself, Stiles was just getting used to the final bit of programming. Not that he could understand any of it, the scientific mumbo-jumbo sailed right over his head whenever Stiles tried to explain.

“Well, it’s gotten pretty late, we should head down to dinner with Laura and Peter.”

“Ah, yeah… about that,” Stiles hedged, his knee bouncing up and down, his trousers making a repetitive _shwf-shwf-shwf-shwf_ sound that was, frankly, annoying as hell. “Not really feeling the whole ‘dinner and socialising’ thing right now. I think I might just hang out up here for a bit. You know. Just chill out.”

“Okay,” Derek replied, a little taken aback because Stiles had never missed a dinner with them. “I can just grab some food from the cafeteria and bring it back and we can spend the night in.”

“ _No_! No, I mean – You should go. Without me.” Stiles flailed his hands, looking a little demented. “I mean – this isn’t me telling you to fuck off, or anything, god, okay so this is coming out way wrong, but I kind of wanted a few hours on my own? And I’m not trying to, like, tell you I don’t want to bathe in the lovely company of you or the other Hales, because you guys are a freaking _delight_ , _aaand_ I think I’m pretty much mangling what I wanted to say and sounding like a total asshole,” Stiles rambled, his words tripping over one another before finally slapping a palm to his face. “Ugh, sorry, I just feel kinda weird after that last update, and I kind of wanted to be alone for a little while?”

“Oh. Yeah, okay.” Derek kept his face impassive and still, trying not to show the tiny fizzle of hurt his chest suddenly burned with. “I got my comms on, then, message me when you’re good for me to come back. Otherwise I can always stay in Laura’s room for the night?”

“You don’t have to sound like I’ve just punched a baby in the face, Derek, this is ou- _your_ room, you know.” Stiles’ mouth turned down in a lopsided frown. “Just a couple of hours, and I’ll be fine.”

“Alright. You want anything to eat?”

“I’m good, thanks. I’ll see you in a bit.”

And, despite all his uncertainties, Derek went to the mess hall and had his usual dinner with Peter and Laura. They seemed a little worried without having Stiles there, but assured that he was alright, they made their way through the usual Hale-sized servings of food, and spent a good while playing Blackjack with a deck of cards Peter had recently pilfered from someone (probably the guy who roomed across from him and played his music too loud, offending Peter’s delicate sensibilities and garnering a severe grudge).

Derek glanced at his watch at what seemed like every two minutes, until a good three hours had passed. Stiles had messaged him twenty minutes earlier, but he’d waited a little longer, just for good measure, before folding his hand in and quitting for the night, at least assured that Stiles would be in a better mood once he returned.

What he _didn’t_ expect, however, was to enter the room and be overwhelmed by the scent of sex.

 _Sex_.

It was barely there. Obviously, Stiles had gone through measures to air out the room, running the air purifying system on high for long enough to have dropped the temperature of the room a couple of degrees. The trash bin was suspiciously empty, lined with a new bin bag. He’d even removed the soiled bed sheet and garments and put them in the laundry chute down the corridor, judging by the clean linens on his top bunk bed and fresh pyjamas.

“How was dinner?” Stiles asked, a little sleepy-sounding, sitting atop of his mattress and his legs dangling off the edge of the bunk, turning a page on his newest paperback. His cheeks were still ever so lightly flushed and he had a flat patch of hair on one side of his head, which he usually only got in the mornings. Derek couldn’t smell anybody else in the room (thank the gods above, because he would have had to _dismember people_ ), but his senses were so attuned to the presence of Stiles that it would be almost impossible for him not to notice. The knowledge of what Stiles had been doing in the room, what he’d set time aside for, specifically to do, made the entirety of Derek’s body heat up from head to toe.

“I’m gonna,” he gestured a thumb behind him over his shoulder vaguely, “Gonna go to the gym for a little while.”

“You okay?” Stiles peered over the railing of his bunk, “You only go to the gym when you’re really pissed off at something, or feeling overly-insecure about your body for a weird, totally unjustified reason.”

“Too many spicy wings,” Derek grunted, because he had absolutely no qualms in making his older sister a scapegoat for his lack of social graces.

“Alright, but I think you look fine as is,” Stiles leaned back against the wall and buried his nose in _Le Petit Prince_.

Derek was at the gym for at least an hour and a half before he finished taking out his frustration on the equipment. He ruined the newest (and heaviest) punching bag by punching a hole through it with his bare fist, and he bent one of the hundred-pound weight plates between his hands, but at least he was able to return to the room without fear of popping a sudden, awkward boner.

 

 

So now Derek had the added conundrum of knowing that, no, Stiles was _not_ asexual like he’d previously thought – he merely hadn't gotten that last part of his programming activated. And to add insult to injury, it was nearly unbearable to spend time around Stiles, because he smelled like deep-bodied arousal _all the time_. It was probably a curse that he was so fascinated with the human body – the first time he’d had to go to the bathroom, he spent close to an hour locked inside, giving a running commentary of it through the door that Derek had desperately tried to block out with a pillow jammed over his ears. Obviously, this was a different kettle of fish altogether, because Stiles spent two days on his own, and Derek was essentially sexiled out of his own room except for the evenings. He thanked whichever god was listening that Stiles didn’t ask to share his bed again, because now that he knew what Stiles’ arousal smelled like, he wouldn’t have been able to hold himself back from doing something regrettable.

And it was _so difficult_ to hold himself back, because if he thought Stiles was attractive before, it couldn’t compare to the suffused flush of red across his cheeks, the punch-drunk, sated sleepiness that he exuded. Derek was banned from the gym until they disembarked because he shredded a sandbag in half thinking about Stiles in his – _their­_ room, stretched out on the bed, curious and wanting, touching himself and making sounds that he refused to think about because they might just break his brain.

“I’ll lend you my classic compilation playlist of Barry White if you just man up and do something about it,” Peter offered, slamming the USB down on the table on their fourth night without Stiles at dinner, “Just, for the love of Christ, stop moping. It’s making me feel sorry for your pathetic ass, and I don’t like feeling in general.”

“I’m not planning on seducing Stiles,” Derek shot back, flicking the offending USB stick away from himself. “Jesus, I don’t want him to be a conquest.”

“He’s right, Uncle Pete, you’ve got a bit of a creepy wrong-bad-touchy vibe going with that idea,” Laura agreed, waving her fingers around vaguely to gesture at Peter’s general everything. “You’ve read too many bodice-rippers that portray the issue of consent in a completely erroneous manner.”

“Maybe I just like reading them and reminding myself that people take that sort of thing seriously,” Peter snapped back. “They’re _hilarious_.”

“Whatever.”

“Whatever _indeed_.”

“I’m leaving,” Derek grumbled, abandoning their table and his squabbling family members. He was tired and edgy, and really in no mood to return to his room and be inundated with the smell of Stiles’ ‘happy alone time’ (where did Laura even come up with these things?). But he wasn’t allowed in the gym anymore – perhaps he could quickly duck inside, take a shower and then hang out in the mess hall with a book until he got too tired to care. It sounded like a good idea, but when he opened the door to the room, he was surprised to find nothing amiss – not the inescapable hint of Stiles’ arousal, or his satiated form sprawled haphazardly across his mattress. Instead, Stiles was at the desk, filling out Sudoku squares on his tablet, smelling freshly showered, the whorl of hair at the crown of his head still slightly damp. He turned at the sound of the door opening and greeted Derek with a wide smile.

“Hey!” he beamed, setting the tablet down. “Have a good dinner?”

“Average at best, like usual,” Derek responded, feeling a little lost. He’d geared himself up so much to beat a hasty retreat from the room that, when faced with nothing to run away from, made him feel slightly disorientated. He took a seat on the edge of his mattress, before he ran out of the room on sheer adrenaline alone. “Laura asked about you again. She says she missed your rapier-like wit. Peter says he definitely hasn’t missed your sarcasm.”

“She’s probably sad that she doesn’t have anybody to make fun of you two losers with,” Stiles mused, closing the little activity book. “I just needed a bit of thinking space, you know? Sometimes it gets pretty confusing and loud up here,” he tapped his temple with a fingertip, “and it’s kinda hard to think properly when you’re around.”

“Am I that much of a distraction?” Derek quipped, expecting some sort of witty rejoinder at his expense. What he didn’t expect, however, was Stiles’ elbow to slide off the edge of the table, knocking over a small stack of books that had previously been perched against the edge. With a strangled curse, Stiles scrambled off his chair and piled the books back onto the desk, then settled back into his chair, leaning back with an air of unaffected coolness despite his beet-red face.

“Smooth.”

“Oh, shut your pie-hole,” Stiles bit back, turning (if possible) even redder.

“Have you eaten? Do you have any plans for the night?” he asked, picking up a towel and heading for the bathroom to wash up for the night. “Because if you wanted more time to yourself, I can always leave for a bit.”

“No, no, I’m all good,” Stiles answered back quickly, “I grabbed something to eat a little while ago. You just – you go do your shower thing. I’m gonna… be here.” He awkwardly waved a hand mindlessly to the room around him.

“I’ll probably head to bed after my shower,” Derek said, just in case Stiles had wanted to do anything in particular, or had planned to stay up any later. It was close to ten, and even though Derek could stay awake longer, he felt mentally drained from so many days of overthinking, re-examining every minute interaction he’d shared with Stiles from all angles. When he didn’t receive a response, he merely shrugged and closed the door to the tiny bathroom. Part of him was tempted to take a long shower, maybe quietly jerk off, have the thrill of knowing the object of his desire was a mere handful of paces away on the other side of a flimsy door. He immediately dispelled the thought with a rough shake of his head, and shucked his shirt off, tossing it angrily into the hamper and feeling disgusted with himself. He was just about to unbutton his pants when a timid knock came on the door. Without a thought, he reached for the knob and pulled it open. Stiles was hovering awkwardly at the doorway, hand still curled in a loose fist as if he’d somehow forgotten to lower it from the position it had been in when he knocked. His mouth was open and gaping, while his eyes seemed transfixed to Derek’s chest, impossibly huge and dark, while the heady smell of arousal – _arousal­ –_ suddenly began coming off of him in waves. Derek, still holding the door open, belatedly realised that he wasn’t wearing a shirt. He steadfastly refused to feel self-conscious, even if his ears did feel a little hot.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, still holding onto the doorknob. The words seemed to snap Stiles out of whatever trance he’d been in, because he quickly took a step back and lowered his hand, his face turning a blotchy red.

“Nothing! I – I needed to ask you – I forgot,” Stiles stuttered. “I’m just… yeah.”

Derek remembered watching a porno start like this, once (in all honesty, it had been one of his favourites). He could imagine himself re-enacting it with Stiles at that moment – pulling him in by the shirt collar roughly, kissing him breathless and tearing his clothes off, fucking him senseless bent over the sink, pressed up against the slick tiles of the shower. The thought alone of Stiles’ hands scrabbling without purchase over the wet surface as Derek pounded into him mercilessly nearly made him short-circuit his brain, and he felt the iron door handle creak ominously between his fingers in an effort to not give in to his mindless, sex-fuelled fantasies.

“Okay,” was all he replied, and then gingerly shut the door between them, making sure to click the lock soundlessly into place. If Stiles barged in on him in the shower, well, he couldn’t be held accountable for his actions, and taking advantage of someone who didn’t know any better was definitely not on his agenda.

“Fucking shit,” he muttered under his breath, switching the shower water on and resigning himself to the fact that his will was as weak as overcooked spaghetti, and cursing himself as he reached for his stash of lube for being an opportunistic creep with vague morals and no self-control.

 

 

If Derek had thought that jacking off in the shower would relieve some tension, then he was sadly mistaken. The room had been dark once he’d finished what had to be undoubtedly the world’s quietest session of backstroke roulette, Stiles already scrunched up beneath his blanket, and Derek had breathed a small sigh of relief at being presented the opportunity to have an awkwardness-free evening of rest.

Boy, was he wrong.

It was evident within the first three minutes that Stiles, while curled up beneath his blankets and out of sight in the darkened room, was affecting a pose of sleep, he was barely able to contain his jitters. Lying on his pallet with his arms behind his head, Derek watched the mattress above him shift and move, the slats beneath it squeaking ever so softly with every turn. Stiles exuded an air of ill-hidden anxiety, and it was making him feel on edge.

“What’s the matter?” Derek asked, what could have been minutes or hours later, when the restless shifting hadn’t abated. Stiles’ head peered over the side, his hair flopping awkwardly in its upside-down position.

“Sorry, was I making a racket?” he asked, face scrunched with worry.

“Kind of,” he said, his voice soft in the darkness, honest. “You seem worried about something.”

“Remember when you said I could talk to you about my nightmares? Does that offer – talking to you, I mean – does it extend to stuff that isn’t about nightmares? Like… real-life stuff?”

“Of course,” Derek replied. Stiles nodded soberly, looking away and chewing the bottom of his lip, thoughtful. It was a long moment before he turned back to look at Derek.

“Can I – can I come down and talk to you about something?”

“Sure.” Derek sat up, switched the small light beside his bed on, and pulled his pillow up from the mattress, wedging it into a corner of the bed and leaning back into it. By the time Stiles had climbed down the small side ladder, he’d pulled himself up into a sitting position with his legs crossed, freeing up a good half of the bed, which Stiles uneasily seated himself upon. Even without his knee bouncing or the nimble fingers picking at the edge of the comforter, Derek could feel the air of anxiety growing around Stiles, smell the nervous sweat springing up between his shoulder blades. Despite wanting nothing more than to reach forward and wrap his arms protectively around the other, Derek held himself still, waiting for Stiles to break the silence on his own.

“I did some thinking,” Stiles said, after long minutes in silence, where Derek was afraid he’d say nothing at all and scuttle back up into his bed, out of sight. “I mean, I’m always thinking lately. It’s like I’m trying to expand the borders of my newly-acquired brain and think non-stop. That’s what all these books are about, you know? It helps me think like other people, like _human_ people.”

“Stiles,” Derek said softly, leaning forward to place his hand over Stiles’ fidgeting one, a gesture of comfort. “Take a deep breath.”

Those words seemed to have an effect, because Stiles stopped his rambling log enough to take in a long breath, and exhale it stutteringly. He repeated the process three more times before he seemed calm enough to relax his shoulders. Derek didn’t move his hand from atop of Stiles’, though. The skin underneath felt warm, soft. Stiles smiled down at their hands, shifted his just enough to free his index finger and rest it beside Derek’s knuckle, cradled in the webbing of the thumb. The gesture was so intimate, so personal, that it constricted everything inside of him. His eyes felt riveted to their clasped hands, even as his tongue felt like it was sticking to the roof of his mouth, unable to say anything, perhaps unwilling to break the moment. He tore his eyes away from their hands to look at Stiles, and immediately regretted the decision, entranced with the dark sweep of eyelashes against his pale cheek, and – fuck, the small, hopelessly tender smile on his face as he continued looking at their entwined fingers, somehow even more captivated at the sight than Derek had been.

“What is it you think about?” he asked, his voice quiet, as if terrified beyond all reason to disrupt their calm, their connection.

“You,” Stiles whispered, finally looking up, meeting his eyes. In the lamplight, they were a lighter brown, a honeyed hue that was almost reminiscent of the golden eyes of a wolf. “Derek, I – I think about _you_. All the time. You’re always there – and if you’re not, I look for you. An AI…” He drew back a moment, gathering his words. “An AI’s Naut is their first priority above anything else. But what I feel when I’m with you – it’s different to what I had with Scott all that time ago. If I had to equate my relationship with Scott, I’d have had to say we were best friends, like brothers. We cared about one another, but for you… It’s so much more than that.”

“What are you saying, Stiles?” Derek breathed, unable to look away, unable to _think_ , because was this really happening? Was he having some sort of hyper-realistic dream? His heart was beating rabbit-fast, echoing the pace of the other’s. Stiles gave his hand a little squeeze.

“Derek,” Stiles said, his voice low and impossibly soft, “I’m saying that I love you.”

Those words should have made Derek’s head spin with giddy joy, make him want to leap forward and envelop Stiles tightly, yell to the highest of heavens with delight. But instead, all he got was the feeling of someone dropping an icy-cold cinderblock into his gut, like someone had circled their fingers around his ribcage and _squeezed_.

“No,” he said, withdrawing his hand.

“No?” Stiles repeated, looking confused, his head cocked to the side just so. “What do you mean?”

“You’re not in love with me,” Derek grated out between clenched teeth, wishing he’d never needed to say those damn words. Stiles gave a little snicker, completely unlike his usual, melodic laughter – it was edged with something afraid, halting and irresolute.

“I’m pretty sure it’s not a joke, Derek,” he said, even as his words came out unsure. “I do lo–”

“You _don’t_!” Derek snarled, the action so sudden that Stiles flinched, jerking back a few inches. His hand, still settled on the sheets, drew back quickly to hover awkwardly by his side.

“Derek?”

“You haven’t even been completely human for two months, Stiles,” Derek said bitterly, the heavy disappointment curdling his words. “You’re wrong.”

“I’m sure that I’m not,” Stiles replied, a hard edge to his expression.

“You have no idea what you want,” Derek shot back, hating that everything he’d ever wanted was sitting on his bed, less than two feet away, but the distance might have well been the breadth of an ocean. “You’ve spent time around me, practically imprinted on me like a duckling. I’m the human you’ve spent the majority of your time with – it’s only normal that you’d feel some… _attachment_ to me. But it’s not love.”

“Oh,” Stiles said hotly, his shoulders stiffened to a straight, indignant line. “So you’re saying that I have no idea what I’m actually feeling? That my feelings are _less_ because you think I’m not… I’m not _human_?”

“Of course I think you’re human, Stiles, don’t be an idiot,” he rolled his eyes, “I just think that, whatever affection you’ve developed for me, you’ve mistaken it for love.”

“You do realize you’ve just called me an idiot, right after dismissing my feelings entirely?” Stiles exclaimed, practically leaping off the bed as if it were made of lava. He whirled around and pointed an accusing finger at Derek, face twisted with anger. “You think less of me because I wasn’t born human, is that it? You think that I can’t distinguish between my facsimiles of emotions because I haven’t had enough years on my side?”

“I never said that!” Derek scrambled up from his seat, the process made slightly more complex by the tangle of the blankets around his legs. His attempts at trying for a reasonable argument were somewhat let down by his own furious scowl. “But you’re obviously confused, and I don’t blame you for being angry – anyone would be on edge if they just started learning how to function as a person, with their bodies and minds and-”

“I’m not ‘ _confused_ ’, Derek!” Stiles aggressively quote-marked in the air with his fingers, a sarcastic gesture that Derek hadn’t seen him make before, but had obviously picked it up from someone –perhaps even from himself. “I might not be one of ARGUS’ most powerful Artificial Intelligence units anymore, but I have enough of a mind to know that my feelings for you aren’t some Attachment Theory-style collective _bullshit_ concept! Why is it so hard to accept the fact that maybe, just _maybe_ , I could have developed romantic sentiments for you?”

“Because you’re _wrong_!” Derek exclaimed, digging fingers into his hair with frustration. Everything was going wrong, and he didn’t know how to stop any of it. He felt like the situation had run away from him, like a train without breaks headed for a cliff, and he had no clue how to steer it away from its inevitable demise. His traitorous mind jumped back to the first night after Stiles’ last appointment, the heady odour of sex hanging in the air of their cabin room. “Just because you’ve discovered what sex and lust is, it doesn’t mean you can project that onto whoever you want!”

“How fucking _dare_ you,” Stiles hissed, stepping into his space, his face blotchy and red with embarrassment and rage, eyes reduced to furious slits. “How _dare_ you say that I’m – I _know_ what I feel. And I _know_ that you feel the same way about me. Why the fuck are you running away from this? We could have something really – are you _afraid_ of me? Are you worried that you’d be taking advantage of me because I don’t know any better?”

Stiles, as perceptive as usual, had hit the nail straight on the head with his observation. Derek was _terrified_ – about leading Stiles into something he might not actually want, about coercing him based on his newly-discovered desire for physical intimacy – most of all, about the possibility of a future together that might end when Stiles realised that Derek wasn’t what he wanted, after all. At his complete silence, Stiles stepped backwards, shaking his head and scowling.

“You don’t get to be the one to tell me if my emotions are real or fabricated. That’s just a giant dick move.”

“Stiles, listen –”

“No. _Fuck you_ , Derek Hale.” Stiles shoved his feet into his shoes by the entryway and slammed his palm against the console, opening the door and storming out of the room. Derek watched him stomp away, the noise of his angry footfalls muted as the door hissed closed again.

He didn’t go after him.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I CAN'T BELIEVE THIS STORY IS FINISHED! *throws confetti into the air*
> 
> Unfortunately, I had to re-submit the final chapter almost immediately after I'd posted it, because a glitch made it cut off halfway through. SORRY ABOUT THAT! Here's the final chapter in all its glory! Also, bonus fan art that I did eight million years ago! :D
> 
> This story could not have happened without the amazing help of [my most esteemed wonderful beta reader](bookgeekgrrl.tumblr.com). You are the knees of bees! ♥♥ Also, thank you to all the beautiful people who have followed this story from the start and left kudos and comments, and encouragement. You guys are wonderful!
> 
> As a special bonus - the song I had playing often (and I feel like it's the soundtrack of the fic) is [Muse's 'Map of the Problematique'.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibRMmLlLz64)

[ ](http://yijitumbles.tumblr.com/post/96621926107/i-trust-you-i-trust-you-with-my-life-and-i)

 

Stiles didn’t return to their shared cabin that night, and Derek expected some degree of coolness from Stiles after that fateful evening and possibly the worst confession of feelings in the history of all time. After practically telling him his emotions were invalid, Derek was more than prepared for the inevitable cold shoulder he would be receiving. What he hadn't expected, however, was for Stiles to become completely absent from his life altogether. He wasn’t at breakfast in the morning, nor present for the rest of the day. When asked, neither Laura nor Peter confessed to having housed him in their own rooms for the night, which left Mahealani’s labs as the only other possible option to have taken him in.

As much as Derek keenly felt his absence, he figured that it was perfectly reasonable for this distance to be put between them. He’d been astoundingly awful to Stiles, and he probably could have worded his response better, but what was done was done, he’d made his metaphorical bed, and now was the time to sleep in it.

Laura, of course, found out almost immediately – she knew him too well to ignore the stench of misery that he was no doubt exuding from every pore. He didn’t _choose_ to continually have Deep and Meaningful Conversations with her, but just one worried crease of her brow, all joking pretence lost, and he was powerless against spilling everything. As Derek’s closest confidante (after Stiles, of course, and just as nosy), she immediately pried the full story from him, and followed it up with an exasperated cuff on the back of the head, followed by a bone-crushing hug so tight that Derek _knew_ his poor ribs would be bruised.

“God, you’re such a _bonehead_ sometimes, baby bro,” she sighed sadly, rubbing soothing circles on his back with the palm of her hand as they hung out in her room in the afternoon. “Why’d you have to go and say something like that to him for? It’s obvious to anybody who has eyes how far gone you are on him.”

“I don’t know why I said that,” Derek mumbled, nose tucked against her neck. “It seemed like the right thing to do at the time.”

“You mean you chickened out,” Laura corrected, still hugging Derek close, except now she had wrapped her legs around her little brother's body, effectively curling around him like a very stubborn koala. "It's so easy to see how much you love him – anybody who couldn't see that would have to be blind, deaf _and_ particularly dumb. And it's so obvious to see how very much he loves you back, Der."  
  
Derek didn't register the high, mournful whine until after some length, and even then he was surprised to realise that it was coming from him. Laura wrapped her arms a fraction tighter, making low, soothing noises as she clung close, trying to soothe her Pack member with touch and physical comfort.  
  
"I love him," Derek admitted, his voice sounding desperately miserable, even to his own ears. "And now he probably hates my guts because I told him he was an idiot."  
  
"Why did you do it?" she asked, perplexed even as she never ceased her soothing motions.  
  
"Because I wanted it to be true,” he mumbled, giving up all pretence of dignity and mashing his face against Laura’s shoulder. “Every time something seems too good to be true, it usually is. Stiles is just – I couldn’t handle it if we had something together, and he realises…”

“Realises what?” she prompted when Derek trailed off.

“…When he realises how much better he can do than me,” Derek finished.

“Oh, Der,” Laura sighed, carding gentle fingers through his hair. “I wish you saw yourself how we see you.”

“Have I done something really stupid?” he asked, pulling away a fraction, too miserable to even lift his eyes.

“A little bit,” she sighed, cupping his face in her hands and rubbing her thumb soothingly against his cheekbones. “But I think you were just really scared, and that’s what made you act like that.” She frowned, thinking. “Did you mean it? What you said about Stiles’ feelings not being real – do you think he’s incapable of feeling love?”

“No,” Derek mumbled. “I think he can. I think he can probably feel more deeply and intensely than most people. I just… I know why _I_ love him so much, I just don’t see why he’d feel that way about _me_.”

“If you can’t see how precious you could be to someone, then _you’re_ probably the blind, deaf and dumb guy I just mentioned.”

“You think he’ll come back?” Derek murmured, his voice uncharacteristically small.

“I don’t know,” Laura replied honestly, “I’d say go after him, but you know Stiles – he’d probably get more pissed off if he didn’t get some room to think on his own. You might just have to wait until he cools off and comes back. But maybe when he does, you should tell him that you actually love him. You know, instead of being a scaredy-cat and calling him names. What are you, five?”

“Sometimes, if the mood strikes or I’m feeling extra pouty,” Derek answered back, nose smushed against Laura’s comfortable sweater. His elder sister must have been in a particularly kind, sympathetic mood, because she just tucked him in closer and held on.

 

 

Stiles didn’t show his face for the next three days, and Derek, who had been keeping his distance from Mahealani’s labs, felt like he might just vibrate out of his skin. Four days seeing neither hair nor hide of Stiles, without hearing his voice or catching his scent, and he was going mad with nervousness. He spent his days waiting in their room, pacing an indent in the soft carpet, rehearsing what he planned to say if Stiles ever showed his face again. His emotions went through a wild rollercoaster ride – one moment he was indignant and angry that Stiles had stormed off instead of hearing him out, the next anxiously worried that Stiles would return to their room, only to demand to be released from Derek’s ownership altogether. Every so often, he’d allow himself a tiny glimmer of hope that perhaps Stiles would return and they could talk, get their feelings sorted out and something – _something_ could evolve from it. But almost instantly that feeling of hope was dashed as his mind sifted through every word he’d spoken, remembered every expression on Stiles’ face during that short, critical argument.

On the fourth day, exhausted from his oscillating moods and his head pounding with thinking too much, he decided to stop moping in his room awaiting Stiles’ return, and take a walk around the compound. Maybe he could clear his head with a brisk, aimless walk, but a small part of him fervently wished he might run into Stiles on his hike. It beat wearing that groove deeper into the carpet, and if he happened to walk past Mahealani’s labs, well, that was just coincidence – after all, ARGUS wasn’t that big a ship, was it?

Except that he ran into Doctor Mahealani himself some few hundred feet away from his lab, and he didn’t even have to open his mouth before Danny chuckled ruefully at him.

“He’s not here, Derek,” he said, and damn it all to hell, Derek couldn’t detect any hint of a lie in that. “And I know you’re wanting his whereabouts, but not only am I not at liberty to say,” he continued, lifting a finger to effectively silence any of Derek’s protests, “But he decided not to tell me where he’s headed off to. So, sorry, but I’m not exactly in the best position to help you out with your lover’s spat.”

“It’s not – that’s not –” Derek stuttered, suddenly and enormously self-conscious. Danny’s expression didn’t change one iota, and, under his knowing, beatific smile, Derek slinked – _slinked_! – away again to resume his walk.

It felt like he’d walked the perimeter of the entire ship by the time he returned to the room, feeling less relaxed and, if possible, somehow more on edge than before. He’d grabbed a bite to eat from the cafeteria on his way back, but morosely declined the invitation to sit with Peter and Laura again. _Fuck it_ , he thought miserably, what he needed was to go back to the room immediately, wait for Stiles like the stupid lapdog he’d suddenly transformed into, and have a good, old-fashioned _sulk_. God, he was pathetic, because a large part of him was tempted to just shift into his wolf form and curl up on the bed and whine non-stop. Maybe marinating in his misery for a while might make him feel better.

As he walked back to the room, however, he was suddenly alerted to a familiar smell, and, heart thumping, he opened the door to the cabin to be met with the sight of Stiles, sitting at the desk, tapping his fingers with impatience against the table top. Stiles, beautiful, maddening, _perfect_ Stiles, whose mouth was drawn down in the corners and who sported dark circles under his eyes, looking as exhausted and put-out as Derek felt, if not more. He was wearing the same standard-issue white pair of scrubs he’d worn on the first day Derek had first physically seen him in the labs, the slightly too-big pants and shirt that didn’t fit him right, not like his regular military civvies provided by ARGUS.

“I – didn’t think –” Derek started, feeling the cold air of the door compression closing a hairs-breadth behind him. He didn’t shift away from the doorway, almost afraid to make a sudden movement, lest it cause Stiles to leave again.

“You didn’t think what?” Stiles prompted, his voice tight and a touch edgy. “You didn’t think I’d come back? Do you think that little of my feelings that one argument was going to drive me away forever?”

“I didn’t know what to think,” Derek agreed, his shoulders sagging with defeat. Stiles smelt all wrong – like the filtered, too-clean air of the labs (he _had_ been right) and the unfamiliar detergent they’d processed his standard lab clothes in, and of days without Derek’s scent near him. He clenched and unclenched his fists hopelessly, words feeling thick and heavy and unfamiliar in his mouth, clumsy with anxiousness. “Everything I said – it came out wrong, I – it’s hard for me to – I don’t really have the… words.” He finished lamely, looking down at the ground, feeling foolish, like he’d just made everything worse.

“You’re really infuriating sometimes, you know that?” Stiles sighed, but as aggravated as his voice sounded, at least it was missing the harsh bite of disgust that had coloured his words all those days ago in their argument, the tone that had been haunting Derek for _days_ , making him feel on the verge of collapse.

“I know,” Derek agreed willingly, still with his eyes at his feet. It was yet another notch to add to the seemingly-endless list of reasons as to why Derek would be the absolutely worst person to be Stiles’ mate. Stiles, who deserved someone so much better, someone who was as perfect as he was, who didn’t stumble over words and wasn’t so emotionally constipated and withdrawn thanks to one awful relationship after another.

“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” Stiles groaned, rising up suddenly from the chair and stomping forwards. He grabbed Derek’s forearm in his long fingers, and Derek stood still, expecting a slap or a punch – something that he obviously felt he deserved. But instead, Stiles steered him across the room with surprising strength (strength that Derek could have easily held his ground against or overpowered, but chose not to) and towards the bunk beds.

“Sit,” he commanded imperiously, pointing to the bottom bunk. Wordlessly, Derek complied, sitting on the edge of his mattress, facing Stiles. Once seated, Stiles spun around and marched the three steps to the desk again, somehow managing to inject as much annoyance in his body language as possible. For the first time, Derek noticed the piles and piles of books stacked on the surface of the table, far more than had ever been in his room at one time, more than any one person could carry. Either Stiles had used a trolley to bring them here, or he’d made multiple trips. Small slips of paper were stuck between the pages, hastily ripped markers of blank paper marking specific pages in the stead of bookmarks.

Stiles grabbed a small paperback from the top of a random pile, and, with an air of utter vexation, opened it to one of the marked spots. He puffed out his chest imperiously, face still etched with anger, and began reading in a voice that left no room for interruption.

_“How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. I love thee to the depth and breadth and height my soul can reach, when feeling out of sight for the ends of Being and Ideal Grace. I love thee to the level of everyday’s most quiet need, by sun and candle-light. I love thee freely, as men strive for Right. I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise. I love thee with passion put to use in my old griefs, and with my childhood’s faith. I love thee with a love I seemed to lose with my lost saints. I love thee with the breath, smiles, tears, of all my life! And, if God choose, I shall but love thee better after death.”_

Then, without a change in his expression, Stiles snapped the small book shut and threw it angrily at Derek, who, with superior reflexes, would have normally caught such an easy target. However, he was so astounded that Stiles was _angrily reading poetry at him_ that he didn’t get his hand up in time to catch it, and caught the book with his face instead.

“Stiles!” he spluttered, fumbling with the book, “What the hell –”

“Oh no, you don’t get to talk,” Stiles snapped back, jabbing a finger at him crossly, making Derek close his mouth with an audible click. Still glaring, Stiles reached back and grabbed another book off the mountainous pile. Derek recognised it as one of the storybooks he’d been reading the other day.

_“If someone loves a flower, of which just one single blossom grows in all the millions and millions of stars, it is enough to make him happy just to look at the stars.”_

“I don’t unders–” Derek began, but Stiles hissed at him – _hissed!_ – with a finger pointed dangerously at the Naut’s face. That finger was slowly brought up, and stuck between the pages further along where another marker sat. He began reading again.

_“The little prince went away, to look again at the roses. "You are not at all like my rose," he said. "As yet you are nothing. No one has tamed you, and you have tamed no one. You are like my fox when I first knew him. He was only a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But I have made him my friend, and now he is unique in all the world.""_

“What-”

 _“My star will be just one of the stars, for you_ ,” Stiles spoke again, interrupting Derek’s words as he found a new marker between the pages. _“And so you will love to watch all the stars in the heavens.”_

This book followed its former in terms of being airborne and pointed directly at Derek’s head, but at least this time Derek had some forewarning. He caught it deftly between his fingers, still shocked that Stiles was pitching paperbacks at him with intention. He tried to ask what the hell was going on, but Stiles shot him another murderous glare when he opened his mouth, so he kept quiet and put the books on the bed beside him. Seemingly appeased, he grabbed another and continued reciting from his marked pages.

_“The best and most beautiful things in this world cannot be seen or even heard, but must be felt with the heart.”_

_“You will never be able to escape from your heart so it’s better to listen to what it has to say. That way, you’ll never have to fear an unanticipated blow.”_

_“In vain I have struggled. It will not do. My feelings will not be repressed. You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you.”_

On and on it went, one quote after another from dozens of books. Stiles must have spent the entire time away from their room doing this, raking through every book he could get his hands on for quotes to express his feelings to Derek. Book after book followed, one heartfelt quote after another, from stories to poetry, prose and autobiographies, each one chipping away at the shield he’d constructed around his heart to protect himself from rejection.

“Why are you telling me these things?” he croaked, feeling overwhelmed, his throat thick. Stiles, the anger finally exorcised from his body, sighed heavily and sat down on the bed beside Derek, toppling the towers of books haphazardly across the surface of the mattress.

“Derek,” he murmured, “ _If I know what love is, it is because of you.”_

“So you pretty much raided the entire library of the ARGUS mothership and trawled through book after book for stupidly romantic quotes and excerpts to… what? Woo me?”

“You haven’t seen me _try_ to woo you yet,” Stiles chuckled, his grin crooked. “You’ll know when I’m trying to woo you, because you won’t be able to see straight with all the hearts.”

“So, what’s this then? Just showing off your impressive reading skills?” he asked, ducking his head and feeling his lips curl upwards into a small smile, the first he’d let himself have since Stiles had left. Beside him, Stiles reached forward and, very slowly, moved his hand to rest atop Derek’s. The move was slow and controlled, giving him plenty of time to move his hand away, as if he were approaching a skittish creature. Derek didn’t move his hand, not this time, and after a few moments Stiles seemed to gather enough courage to lace their fingers together, and Derek let it happen, clasping Stiles’ long fingers within his own. It was – a really nice feeling, if he had to be honest with himself, clasping their hands together like that. It was nice to finally let himself have something.

“I spent days going through every book I could in the library,” Stiles murmured, “Desperately trying to make sense of what I was feeling. I thought – what you said to me –”

“I was wrong –”

 “ – what you said to me,” Stiles continued, on a roll and apparently determined not to be side-tracked from his thoughts, “I thought about it really hard. I analysed it from every conceivable angle I could. It made sense, maybe, that I was confusing my feelings for attachment. But then I went through the books, and my logic fell through. What I feel for you,” he chuckled, and Derek tightened his hold on Stiles’ hand, the sound of it genuine and thrilling, “It didn’t make sense. It still doesn’t. But I get it now, I understand. Love isn’t – it’s not _supposed_ to be logical, it’s not supposed to make sense. Love is confusing and weird, and kind of really scary, but from every account I’ve heard it’s supposed to be the best thing in the world. And,” he ducked his head, looking impossibly shy, “when I look at you, I can believe it.”

That admittance was quite possibly the most romantic thing Derek had heard in his life, and knowing that it was directed at him, that it was entirely genuine coming from Stiles, no blip of a lie in his heartbeat whatsoever, made his head spin. It made him want to say something equally as passionate, impress Stiles with eloquent, heartfelt adorations and show him just how much he felt for him, what the brand of _mate_ inspired in him.

“I’m really in love with you,” was what he blurted out instead, and he winced at the idiotic simplicity of his confession.

Stiles laughed, but it wasn’t at him, it wasn’t mean-spirited and derogatory as he’d feared. It was a light, joyous rapture of sound, and he nudged Derek’s shoulder gently with his own. “I know you are,” he said, eyes twinkling with unfiltered joy. “I was getting some mixed signals at first, but I figured that you were just being your usual, self-sacrificing moronic self.” He pulled back just a fraction, unlacing their hands. Derek had only a moment to miss that touch, because Stiles was gathering him up in his arms, the embrace a little awkward from their seated positions beside one another, but perfect all the same. Derek immediately latched on, winding his arms around Stiles and burying his nose against the soft skin beneath his jaw, taking in great lungfuls of air and the sharp, sweet scent of _Stiles_ at its strongest place, just beside the pulse point.

“I didn’t want to trap you in something you mightn’t want later on,” he mumbled, thrilled with having such contact with the other, of finally being able to run his fingertips through the hair at Stiles’ nape – it was exactly as soft as he’d always dreamed it would be. “You didn’t know – I mean, you don’t really know what it’s like, to be with someone yet-”

“I’m trying to, you know!” Stiles retorted, leaning back a little and pouting.

“I know you are,” Derek acquiesced, dropping his hands to rest onto Stiles’ shoulders. “But I was – I’m scared, okay?”

“Of me?” Stiles laughed, disbelievingly. “Big, strong Naut like you is scared of a wimpy AI who was no bigger than your hand a month ago? Dude, I don’t even know how much I can lift yet, that gym’s scary-looking, but whatever it is, I’m betting good credit points that it’s way less than what you can.”

“You make me feel – _things_ , okay?” he sighed, but it was with open affection. “You’re nosy, and aggravating, and sometimes really freaking annoying, you talk too much and eat too fast and I feel like you’re a giant pain in the ass sometimes –”

“You’re really working that charm, Derek, I’m swooning,” Stiles snarked.

“ – but I know that, when I’m with you, I _feel_ so much more than I usually do. Before you, everything was just…”

“… Kinda meh?”

“Yeah,” he chuckled. “I just – I wasn’t looking forward to anything in my future. But when I’m around you, I just – I get all strung up in all these different emotions, and it’s exasperating and confusing and sometimes you’re just _really annoying_ –”

“Okay, I get it, can we get off the annoying train now?” Stiles grumped.

“ – but you’re the most amazing thing that’s ever happened to me.” Derek smiled, letting the feelings he’d kept inside for so long finally surface, and it was liberating and exhilarating and terrifying all at the same time. “I want to spend years of my life with you, arguing about stupid shit. I want to show you my childhood home and the places I grew up, I want you to meet my family and live on Earth with me and learn how to cook and fish, I want to grow old together and get a dog and a house of our own.”

“ _Holy God_ ,” Stiles breathed, brushing his fingertips along Derek’s jaw and cradling his cheek against his palm. Derek didn’t stop himself from nuzzling into that warmth, the heady sensation of Stiles’ smooth skin brushing against the stubble of his face.

“And I also really want to kiss you right now,” he finished, feeling superbly pleased that, at those words, Stiles’ adorable blush seemed to blow out into a full-face flush, from the tips of his ears all the way down his neck, the rest hidden by his shirt. Derek really, _really_ wanted to know how far down that blush reached, and, with a startling, gripping awareness, realized that _he just might_.

“You can’t say shit like that to me, oh my god, I think I’m having some kind of heart attack,” Stiles mumbled.

“Is that a yes, then?” he smirked, shifting fractionally closer on the mattress, tilting his head just a touch. Stiles’ breath was against his cheek, oddly sweet and so very Stiles that it made his senses tingle all over. One hand snaked up behind Stiles’ head, cradling his nape gently, and his thumb brushed the sensitive area behind Stiles’ ear which made him shiver deliciously (and Derek deposited that knowledge for use in the near future).  
  
“Yes, yes, action has been approved, one-hundred percent a yes, all systems go,” Stiles murmured, and that was all Derek was waiting for, because the scant inch between them was closed immediately as their lips met in the middle.

Kissing Stiles was – well, he didn’t know what he’d been expecting. A metallic tang, perhaps, from the android body he wore that wasn’t entirely human. But all he found was the warm, soft push of plush skin against skin, the unbelievable scent of all things that were good and home and _Stiles_. He was loath to admit it, but he felt like one of those idiots in one of Peter’s bodice-rippers for a split second, because he would swear to any jury that he saw fireworks exploding behind his eyelids. Stiles kissed completely differently to his personality, halting and exceedingly shy at first, both of their lips barely moving against each other’s. The cause of it was most likely inexperience, and Derek hoped that Stiles would want to approach kissing like all other endeavours his new human body afforded him, because he wanted very, very much to keep kissing Stiles for a long time. Stiles made a sort of strangled noise, and Derek pulled back, worried, until the other let out a huge breath of air, his face blotchy and crimson.

“You don’t need to hold your breath when kissing, you know,” Derek chuckled, watching Stiles take in deep, gulping breaths.

“Well I’m _sorry_ if this is all new to me,” the other huffed, voice sharp with embarrassment, but Derek just grinned and shifted closer still.

“Is it okay?”

“More than! I mean, it’s definitely, absolutely okay. Statistically-impossible three-hundred percent okay, more kissing needs to happen and immediately.”

“Breathe through your nose,” he instructed with a grin, and brought their lips together again. Stiles was, as usual, a fast learner, and the soft breaths against his cheek as they kissed only heightened the surreal, amazing experience. When Derek coaxed his mouth open and slipped his tongue inside, Stiles made this small, hitched whimper and clung to his shirt, making him almost see stars. Their kissing remained slow and careful, tentative, even as Stiles wound his arms around Derek’s neck and their bodies pressed closer, as if testing the limits of their own skin. After so long yearning for Stiles, Derek was fighting every primal urge in his body to resist giving into his wolf, to throw Stiles down against the bed and claim him as mate – an urge that was facilitated by Stiles’ ever-demanding kissing, growing bolder and more confident.

“I love you,” Derek panted, breaking the kiss and leaning his forehead against Stiles’, knowing that if they kept kissing, it would eventually lead to sex, and he didn’t think he could handle anything more than their emotional roller-coaster ride for the moment. Still, it was pretty huge for him to be able to say that openly, so he said it again, grinning so wide he felt his face would split. “I’m really fucking in love with you.”

“I think,” Stiles gasped, breathless and flushing as he pulled back fractionally, “Well, I think I definitely like kissing better than anything else I’ve done as a human, and that includes eating and pooping.”

The cackling, surprised laughter that erupted after that was cut short when Derek body-slammed him against the mattress with a winded ‘ _oof!_ ’, and then was cut off for another reason altogether as their lips mashed awkwardly against each other’s, and it was sort of fucking perfect.

 

 

“So I’ve been thinking that maybe you should fuck me,” was what Stiles came out with, two mornings after their disgustingly soppy confession to one another. Derek, who’d been packing some of his belongings into containers, punched a hole in the bottom of the cardboard box he’d been holding.

“ _Jesus Christ_ ,” he muttered, surprised to see that his claws had popped out and even more shocked that he hadn’t aerated his other arm. “Please, Stiles, don’t set the mood for a romantic segue or anything. My poor, fragile heart can only take so much wooing.”

“I just think,” Stiles continued, lounging on the bed and being no help whatsoever in the packing process, “that our relationship is at a stage where we can move forward and grow through physical intimacy. Especially considering the fact that we’ve done our Big Talk, it’s out of the way with now, and we can move onto more fun stuff.” He flicked another paper aeroplane he’d been working on in the air again, grinning delightedly when it soared three feet and joined the small pile of its comrades scattered across the floor.

“Since our so-called ‘Big Talk’, we’ve slept in the same bed twice and exchanged a total of one handjob, which you got overly emotional about,” Derek deadpanned, trying in vain to piece the box back together (a task doomed to fail) and facing away from Stiles so he couldn’t see his face.

“I was _overwhelmed_ ,” Stiles argued, slapping the palm of his hand against the mattress for emphasis, “It’s not every day you have a sexual awakening when you find out the person you’re in love with has an amazing wrist technique.”

“You actually _cried_ a little bit,” Derek reminded him, sounding sarcastic to cover up the memory of how those tears had dampened Stiles’ cheeks, clumped his eyelashes together and made them look startlingly dark against the ivory backdrop of his skin. How Derek had frozen, horrified, before Stiles had urged him on with feverish whispers (“No, no, Derek, I’m alright, I’m, ah, _ah_ – _there_ , there therethere oh god, don’t stop _Derek_ ”), how warm and slick and _perfect_ he’d been beside him, in the tight circle of his hand, scrabbling at his shoulders and trying his hardest to reciprocate (not that Derek really cared about Stiles’ technique, because just having his long-fingered hand against his dick was almost enough to make him come in his briefs like a teenager again). Clinging to one another and breathlessly gasping into each other's mouths, panting too hard to kiss, Derek had pushed Stiles into orgasm, and then watched, enraptured, as he'd stroked him through his aftershocks, until he'd gone boneless and trembling against the sheets, whimpering with oversensitivity. Remembering all this made Derek wonder why they'd even left the bed - if it had been his decision, they wouldn't have left.

Still, he couldn't shackle Stiles to the bed, as much as he wanted to. They had responsibilities, like seeing Peter and Laura for dinner, and packing their stuff away for when they finally disembarked ARGUS.

"I'm not going to fuck you, Stiles," he sighed rolling his eyes and abandoning all hope with the mangled box.

"Why not?" Stiles cried out, sitting up suddenly and scattering bits of half-folded paper all over the place.

"Because I want our first time to mean something," he pointed out, resting his hands against his hips. "When it happens, it's not going to be a casual thing - I'm going to make love to you, and it's going to be good, not a hurried fuck for the sake of it. There'll be plenty of time for quickies later on, but your first time is going to be fucking spectacular and everything you deserve, and I'll make it so emotional and good that you'll probably cry again."

Stiles' mouth flapped open and closed for a moment, speechless, before he cleared his throat awkwardly.

"I'm finding this resoluteness of yours very attractive right now," he croaked.

"That's what I thought," Derek smirked. "Now come help me pack."

 

 

It took two more days of unbelievable sexual tension before they ended up doing anything about it. Derek knew Stiles was working himself up into a dizzying knot of worry because that was what Stiles did, when confronted with a situation that he could find millions of search results for online, but couldn’t actually do anything about. And as for Derek himself, well, he wanted it, _god,_ he wanted it more than anything, but he needed to wait, needed it to be something special between them, not just a hurried means to a very naked end. Not to mention the fact that he was currently warring between his regular, human emotions and those of his Wolf, who wanted to claim Stiles every minute of every day, make him submit and find completion with him. And, most importantly, Derek was resisting the impulses of his body, telling him that he needed to begin the courtship rites immediately, to show Stiles that he would be a good provider by presenting him with a kill, something for their den, something bright and fat with meat, with deep red lifeblood still clinging to its fur.

A problem, if there ever was one, especially considering their current location had a distinct lack of wild game, and bringing Stiles a slightly-undercooked slab of meatloaf from the cafeteria didn’t pack quite the same punch as a fresh deer would.

But having Stiles in his life as a significant other was… good. Great, even, and that was with Derek drastically underselling just how fantastic he felt. Stiles was there by his side when they went to sleep at night, trading their goodnight greetings for soft, slow kisses and contented sighs, and he was there in the morning when Derek woke up, curled against his chest and bracketed by his arms, the sleepy, warm scent of him strong as he breathed against the short hair on the back of his neck. Feeling Stiles’ fingers twined loosely with his own, his constantly-raised heartbeat slowed in sleep to a gentle rhythm, the snuffled, heavy-eyed laughter when Stiles complained about the scratchiness of Derek’s beard against his shoulder – all these moments, as trivial and inconsequential as they sounded, had fast become Derek’s most cherished moments of the day.

The problem was that, each time they started kissing and getting somewhere, Derek always backed down from taking it further. And while Stiles complained about it, Derek could see that he was more than a little relieved at those times. More than anything, Derek wanted to have sex with Stiles when both of them were ready, not rushing because Stiles felt compelled to fulfil some sort of sexual quota to keep their relationship afloat. A relationship which had, if they were being honestly accurate, only been formed four days prior. Their tally sat at three handjobs (one a memorable romp in the shower), and more kissing than Derek had been able to count. He was happy to wait it out a little longer, to get there gradually.

Even so, all his good intentions seemed to fly out the window when, that night, Stiles slid his hands up beneath Derek’s shirt while they were making out under the covers. Derek’s bed was by now officially ‘their’ bed, using the top mattress as an extra storage shelf for their boxes, clearing the room of the clutter from their packing. Derek hadn't expected anything more from their evening kiss before sleeping, and, perhaps, Stiles hadn't consciously offered anyway, just simply lost himself in the sensation of lips against lips as he laid on his back, Derek draped over him and trading one slow kiss after another.

They were both keeping it measured, in no hurry to get anywhere, since there didn’t seem to be a destination in particular. But Stiles made this sweet little noise, a pleased little whimper, and coupled with his fingertips caressing a slow arc beneath his thing sleeping shirt, well, there was no way he couldn’t deepen that kiss a little more, twist his torso just a fraction to pin Stiles down below him. They were both hard, but not unbearably so – just the result of kissing for so long, combined with the occasional slow roll of hips. But as Stiles clung to his back, their bodies aligned of their own – one of Stiles’ legs bent at the knee and came up to bracket Derek in, brushing against his side and sloping his hips within the cradle of Stiles’ pelvis. The motions were so natural and unassuming that Derek, with his mind already short-circuited by Stiles’ lips and skin, didn’t think anything of slipping his hand lower, trailing his fingers along the other’s side, resting on the jut of his lean hipbones.

“Stiles,” he mumbled, breaking away only far enough to duck his head and kiss beneath his jaw, to suck a bright, blooming mark at his jugular, “You okay?”

“Mm-hmm,” was the only reply he received, because Stiles seemed to be too busy trying to plaster himself all along Derek’s body to care about formulating actual coherent dialogue. The shirt was feeling constricting and bunching awkwardly under his armpits, so Derek pulled back just enough to give himself some room to yank it over his head, tossing it somewhere in the vague direction of the rest of the room. If the pleased sigh from Stiles was anything to go by, the view must have been good – spurred on by his amazing, tender sounds, Derek swooped back in and captured those distracting lips into another kiss, licking his way into Stiles’ mouth as his hands, moved of their own accord, pulling at Stiles’ oversized shirt until the other got the hint and sat up enough for him to pull it off, too.

It wasn’t as though they hadn't seen each other naked before. Even so, their relationship was so new that, as hands wandered and found waistbands of sleep pants, they were hesitant and unsure enough to keep it somewhat less frenzied. Stiles seemed to be drunk on kissing, because when Derek’s fingers slipped beneath the elastic of his briefs, he didn’t jump with surprise like he’d always done before. Instead, he made a little noise of urging, and Derek took that as permission to dip those searching digits further down and grasp the heated, hardening flesh underneath. In answer, Stiles body bucked under his just a fraction, but he was spurred on by the way that his legs eagerly braced around his hips, encouraging him on. His hand was dry and he didn’t stroke so much as cup Stiles’ dick in his palm, and he moved his fingers a fraction lower to cup beneath his balls and reach further back, but a sudden thought made him pull back again from the vivid mark he was working on, situated too high to be hidden by a collar.

“Do you want this?” he asked, breathless even as the cloying, thick scent of Stiles’ want filled the room, combined with his own and made it near impossible to focus on anything else.

“Are you seriously asking me this right now?” Stiles raged, except the words came out more like an undignified squeak. Any attempt to scooch back further was halted by Stiles’ legs clamping tightly around his waist, which Derek could have easily gotten out of with his superior strength, but had no intention of doing so whatsoever.

“Yes, I’m asking you,” he growled in response, sub-vocal and deep in his chest, mirroring the need-want burning in the very marrow of his bones. “I need to hear you say it out loud – yes or no, Stiles?” His hand was aching to move, awkwardly stilled against Stiles’ erection, even as he made aborted little thrusts to make him move further south.

“Holy fuck, it I wasn’t so completely gone on you, I’d cut your dick off and toss it out the airlock just for stopping,” Stiles threatened, “Yes. _Yes_ , all systems go, green light, pass Go, collect two hundred dollars –”

“I don’t think that’s how the phrase goes –” he added, wondering where Stiles had heard that from, since he’d probably never laid his hands on a Monopoly board before.

“I will _castrate you_ and laugh at your tears!”

“You like my dick too much for that,” he smirked, and then skated his fingers lower down, circling the pad of his middle finger around the tight pucker of Stiles’ hole. After that initial brush, any and all complaints seemed to die on Stiles’ lips as he went completely silent, breathing heavily and just waiting for Derek to keep moving. Which he very well planned to, just not quite yet – first, obviously, he needed lube, but even before that, he was curious about something.

“Have you ever done this to yourself?” he asked, tracing his fingertip ever so lightly over the tender bit of skin, feeling the anticipatory tremble of Stiles’ entire body increase as he did so. The edge of the elastic was digging into the back of his hand awkwardly.

“Like, maybe once or twice. Or a few times after I found out what my dick was actually programmed for,” Stiles squeaked to the ceiling, his knobbly kneecap digging almost painfully into Derek’s waist. “Okay, so pretty much right after I discovered masturbation, like, every time.”

“And?” he prompted.

“It felt kind of weird at first, but once I got into the hang of it I thought my testicles were going to explode with how hard I came.”

“That’s… certainly good to know,” he replied, trying (and somewhat failing) to keep the amusement off his face as he withdrew his hand and reached over to the bedside cabinet, looking for his stash of lube. A few moments were spent trying to sort themselves out – while Derek fumbled with the cap of the lube bottle, Stiles tried to disentangle himself from his sleeping pants and briefs, almost kicking Derek in the head during the process and coming close to spraining his kneecaps in the rush. But then Derek was back on top of Stiles, crowding him down between himself and the sheets while his fingers, now warm and slippery with lubricant, dipped low between them again. At the first gentle press of his middle fingertip against Stiles’ hole, Derek couldn’t suppress the low rumble of desire, echoed by Stiles’ urgent noises. His finger slipped past the tight entrance, and he shuddered at the wet, hot heat of him.

“God, _Stiles_ ,” he mumbled, punch-drunk with lust, taking the other’s mouth in a deep kiss as he sunk his finger in to the second knuckle. “I wish – I wish you could see how amazing you look right now. How good you smell.” Even in the dark, his eyes could see traces of the beautiful rosy hue splashed across his skin, the tangy-sweet bite of scent from their sweat and Stiles’ skin, the drop of precome already smudging against Derek’s abdomen from Stiles’ cock brushing against them. Last time he’d given Stiles a blowjob, he’d come hard and sudden from Derek just pressing the tip of his thumb against his hole – he was sure that, this first time, Stiles probably wouldn’t last very long, but then again, neither would he.

He pulled his finger out a little, then gently pushed back in again, eliciting a pleased sigh from the other, so he did it again, and again, this time sinking as deeply as he could, until the heel of his palm was touching the skin behind Stiles’ balls. Stiles, usually so vocal during their fooling around, seemed to be more quiet than usual, and when Derek tore his eyes away from the entrancing sight of his finger disappearing into him, he saw that Stiles’ hands were clenched into fists, crossed at the wrist in front of his mouth, stifling the noises that were so desperately trying to escape.

“Let me hear you,” he urged, tracing the fingers of his free hand along the fragile skin of Stiles’ wrist, not tugging at it, but letting him know of his intentions nevertheless.  “Stiles, let me hear your voice. Is it good?”

“Oh _god_ ,” Stiles breathed on a heavy exhale, dropping his hands and clutching the sheets like a drowning man. “You have no idea, man, it’s not like my fingers are as thick as yours, and then it’s hard to get a good angle, and –” His words broke off on a whine as Derek added another finger, his index, and pumped them both in slowly, scissoring ever so slightly, stretching him.

“Still going okay?” Derek asked, tracking the emotions on Stiles’ face as he kept moving his fingers, going torturously slow when all he wanted to do was overwhelm Stiles, take him apart inch by inch.

“Yep, yep, definitely o- _huohmygod, do that again,_ ” Stiles’ entire body bucked upwards as if zapped, and, grinning, Derek hooked his fingers and tried to find that special spot inside of him that made him react so, pressing against it and massaging it gently while the pad of his thumb stroked the soft skin of his hole, stretched so deliciously around his fingers. His wrist was starting to ache in this awkward position, but he was more than willing to continue this discomfort if he could draw out more of those wonderful noises, make Stiles’ body move of its own accord because of something he was doing, something that made both of them feel so _right_. He was hard inside his own sleep pants, the unforgiving cotton tight and constricting against his dick, but he knew that, if he were to try and pull it out now, he wouldn’t be able to resist rubbing against Stiles’ hip mindlessly, seeking out his own pleasure. He wanted to make it good for Stiles, too, not just himself.

After the third finger, Stiles was practically hysterical with need, flailing and clawing at the pillow beneath his head, pulling at Derek’s shoulders. “Derek,” he panted, “Derek, Derek _Derek_ , stop, stop stop,” he whined, and Derek froze like a statue, three fingers deep and thumb pressed against Stiles’ hole.

“Am I hurting you?” he asked, worried even though he made sure to go slowly, hadn't smelled any pain or hurt aside from very mild discomfort at first, and used so much lube that it was dripping down his wrist.

“You… you need to – put it in me now,” Stiles panted, chest heaving as if he’d run a marathon. “I’m gonna come soon –”

“You can come –”

“I don’t wanna come!” Stiles hissed, eyes wild, “I want you to be inside me when I come because I’m probably gonna pass out!” Looking down, Derek could believe that – Stiles’ dick was dark and wet, heavy against his stomach and twitching, making a mess of Stiles’ stomach with precome, and the dark patch on the front of his own pants said that he was probably in the same position. He’d be lucky if he didn’t come the minute he pulled his erection free, the thought of painting Stiles white with his come tempting. When he pulled his fingers out, Stiles made an honest-to-god heartbroken noise, so far gone on need that his pleas were almost unintelligible. Murmuring assurances and nuzzling against his temple, Derek somehow managed to gather his wits enough to pull his pants down and off, keeping his clean hand against Stiles’ skin as a constant point of contact, like a completed circuit between their bodies. He hissed when his lubed hand finally – _finally –_ made contact with his dick to slick himself up, gripping the base of it tightly and taking a deep breath, then another, to centre himself. If he came before he got to actually penetrate Stiles, he probably wouldn’t be forgiven for quite some time. He dazedly wiped his hand against his discarded sleep pants and gathered Stiles up into his arms, murmuring nonsense as he hitched the other’s hips up a little around his own. The first push inside of him was dizzying, the blunt head of his cock breaching the tight ring of muscle at an agonisingly slow pace. Worried about causing pain, Derek moved glacially slow, all senses focused on Stiles’ breathing, his heartbeat and the scent of him, gauging for discomfort.

“Everything okay?” he asked, nearly breathless with the restraint he was exercising to not just push in and claim, to go wild with feral hunger and pound Stiles through the mattress – at least, not for their first time.

“It hurts,” Stiles panted, trying to haul him in closer by the shoulders, “It kind of feels really weird but don’t you dare stop, Derek, don’t stop, oh god.”

And whatever self-control Derek had left, whatever infinitesimal shred of restraint he was holding onto, evaporated like smoke. With a strangled groan, he surged forward and buried himself to the root inside of him, simultaneously pressing his nose into the junction of Stiles’ neck and shoulder. For a few moments, neither of them moved – Stiles shivering and making tiny, shuddering pants, and Derek heaving in great gasping breaths, shuddering and trying his damndest not to let his wolf take over and run wild, not when he could scent and feel the edge of pain in Stiles, the very smallest amount of ache despite how careful and slow they both had gone.

“You can move,” Stiles mumbled a minute or two later, though it could have been an eternity. His arms, wound around Derek’s shoulders, tightened fractionally so, the fingers of one hand weaving through the short hairs on the back of his nape and giving a slight tug that went directly to Derek’s dick. “Derek, please move.”

Derek was not a virgin, not by far. His previous (and disastrous) relationships had divested him of any shred of virginity, not to mention the multitude of hook-ups and one-night stands he’d had in between to scratch the itch. But nothing had prepared him for this experience with Stiles – not to say that his previous relationships should be invalidated, per se, because he had loved each and every person he’d been with before – Paige and Jennifer, and yes, even _Kate_ , as much as she’d been a heinous bitch in the end. But never once had Derek experienced the almost fathomless depths of his emotions as he did in that moment, with Stiles beneath him and surrounding him. He reasoned that it was the mate bond being finally, irrevocably consummated, because never before had his soul and body felt so perfectly in sync, like pieces made whole, completed by another person that was Pack and Mate and _Stiles_. Many people who didn’t understand Lycans related their wolf as a separate entity to them, but it was the opposite – the wolf and the person were two sides of the same coin, two halves of a whole. Finally being with Stiles, it was a feeling beyond compare.

The first thrust was more of a slow roll of hips, which made them both draw thick inhales. Derek pulled himself up on his elbows, bracketing Stiles in between his forearms and trailing lips over his sweating brow, the strands of his messy hair. He kept his movements slow and gentle, because that was all he was capable of at this point. Neither of them seemed to have the capability for words anymore, because the only noises they were able to articulate were cut-off gasps, moans and sub-vocal mutters. Derek was pretty sure that every single one of his brain-cells had exploded and fizzled into non-existence, because all he could focus on was Stiles – Stiles’ skin, and heat, and his symphony of sounds, each more precious and exquisite than the last. Their bodies undulated and surged against each other’s, sometimes out of rhythm but nevertheless perfect.

“Derek,” Stiles panted, his voice hoarse from the constant stream of exclamations, “Harder – do it harder.”

With a moan at this lascivious request, Derek complied, never getting faster from his measured pace, but snapping his hips _harder_. His fingers clutched at the sheets, fingernails extended into claws and tearing at the cotton as Stiles’ hands clutched tightly at his back, fingertips pressing so hard that he would have had bruises, had his body not possessed an accelerated healing ability. He could feel his orgasm building like a tidal wave, making his entire body feel on fire, like thousands of neurons were fizzling electricity down his limbs towards his very centre like the explosion from a dying star. Stiles’ cock, trapped between their bodies, was rubbing against his stomach with every movement, precome sticky and slick and making everything wet and deliciously filthy. A particularly sharp twist of his hips made Stiles’ voice crack on a sharp cry, his back arching into a dramatic bow.

“Oh _shit_! _Derek,_ right _– fuck!_ Fuck fuck – _fuck!_ ” Stiles enthused, seemingly having run out of vocabulary save for those few words – not that Derek was faring any better, because he’d become monosyllabic altogether, punctuating each snap of his hips with a grunt, barely able to get enough conscious thought together to reach down between them and grasp Stiles’ erection in his fingers, pumping his fist in time with his thrusts. It hardly took more than a few jerks for Stiles to freeze suddenly, spine bent at an almost impossible curve off the bed as he came with a broken wail, eyes screwed shut and nails leaving crescent-shaped indents in the meat of Derek’s shoulder. His entire body thrummed and tightened, clutching around Derek’s cock which, only moments later, proved too much. With a pained, animalistic noise verging on a whimper, Derek came harder than he had ever remembered having done so in his entire life, holding himself up on his forearms, both of their mouths open and panting wetly into one another’s, too strung-out and overwhelmed to kiss.

Derek only just managed to avoid crushing Stiles with his body. With what little energy he had left, he rolled over to his side, moving Stiles a little with him, and gingerly pulled out even if all instinct screamed at him to stay where he was, buried deep inside his mate. Stiles, still breathing like a winded horse, trembled with aftershocks in his arms. Sticky, sweaty and sated, Derek gathered him closer despite the suffocating heat in the room, touching every inch of the other he could as he ran his hands all over Stiles’ skin, soothing and marking his territory as he rumbled deep in his chest with pleasure. Lying under the sheets together, their legs tangled between one another’s and bodies pressed flush, Derek could imagine wanting to be anywhere else.

“Gimme…” Stiles mumbled, sounding blissed and sleepy and thoroughly _fucked out, Jesus Christ_ , “Gimme a few minutes, and I’ll be good for round two.”

“There doesn’t need to be a round two,” Derek pointed out, taken aback at how gravelly his own voice was. He needed to go to the bathroom and get them a washcloth to clean up, but somehow he couldn’t muster the willpower to disentangle himself from the human pretzel that was nuzzling at his jawline.

“Uh, yeah there does,” Stiles replied, punctuating his argument with an enormous yawn and stretching his limbs contentedly like a cat, before snuggling even closer. “I did so much research on sex, we need to do a _lot_ of it, for all that time we wasted being around one another and not boning. It was _way_ better than anything I’d expected.”

“Oh yeah?” he asked, feeling puffed up at the compliment, his instinct to preen with self-assurance overwhelming.

“Yeah, it was like you were a PSM –”

“ – a what?”

“ – like, a Prostate Seeking Missile, going straight for it, like _nyoom_.” He made a sort-of aeroplane-esque hand motion which, for anybody else, would have effectively killed the mood, but thanks to their time together didn’t affect the afterglow. Not too badly, at least.

“You’re an idiot,” Derek grumbled, but it came out stupidly fond, so whatever. He kissed Stiles briefly, who had begun to doze, and then started pulling himself out of bed.

“No, nooooo, where are you going?” Stiles whined, trying to pull him back into bed like an overly-affectionate octopus. “We need to snuggle, Derek, I want to experience spooning!”

“We’ll spoon when I clean us up,” he answered, extricating himself from the tangle of limbs and ducking into the bathroom to get a damp cloth. “I don’t think you’d be eager to spend time pressed up against someone when you’re crusty and stuck together with come.” He quickly cleaned up the mess on his stomach, dampened a hand towel with warm water and wrung it out, padding back into the room, unselfconscious of his nakedness.

“Maybe I don’t mind the spooge so much, as long as I’m rewarded with that view,” Stiles replied, watching Derek avidly (if somewhat sleepily) from the bed. Derek rolled his eyes and plopped the towel wetly on Stiles’ bare belly (earning a squawk of surprise) before cursorily cleaning up most of the mess they’d made and disposing the towel in the general direction of the laundry basket.

“Five-star treatment and everything,” Stiles sighed, making grabby-hand motions at Derek until he came back to bed. Once they were both lying down, Derek on his back and Stiles curled up beside him, half draped over his chest, Stiles let out another yawn, this one followed by a bone-deep sigh of pure contentment. “This is amazing,” he mumbled, nudging closer still, drawing his fingertips over Derek’s chest as Derek drew lazy spirals of his own across Stiles’ skin.

“I’m sorry it hurt,” he murmured.

“It got better. It got way, _way_ better, trust me,” Stiles replied, and Derek laughed on an exhale, feeling the grin pressed up against his collarbone. “But it’s way more exhausting than doing it by yourself, that’s for sure. It was pretty scary at first, but then I sort of remembered it was you and me, and we’re both kind of giant dorks, and then you did that thing where I kind of stopped thinking altogether, so it was all good in the end.”

“We’ve got plenty of time ahead of us for practice,” he said, still dragging soothing strokes up Stiles’ arm, never wanting to stop. “We’ve got all the time in the world to learn how to love one another. So let’s sleep for now.” As much as he wanted to get hard again, to keep fucking Stiles senseless, he really could have done with a sleep after such a long day of packing and paperwork. Tomorrow, he figured, they could spend the entire day in bed, figure out what they like. Maybe he could talk to Stiles about their mate bond, his knot. Imagining Stiles pinned under his weight, taking his knot so sweetly and tightly, making those exquisite noises while they remained locked – even as exhausted as he felt, his body made a valiant effort for a second round.

“You get super sappy when you’re sexed out, good to know.” Stiles smirked, his tone cloyingly sentimental. “But yeah. Sleep now, sleep is good,” he agreed, wriggling and shifting their limbs so that Derek was spooning him from behind. “We need as much energy as possible. My research was extensive, and tomorrow I plan on perfecting the art of blowing you.”

 

 

**EPILOGUE**

 

“How’re you feeling?” he asked, hitching the strap of his bag higher on his shoulder. The room was empty, their boxes already on their way to the main base for pick up once the ship had docked. Cora was meeting them at the base with a rental truck to pick up their stuff, drive them back to Beacon Hills and _home_. Laura and Peter were already at the gates, chatting with some of their friends. All that was left was for Derek and Stiles to leave their old room.

“I’m fucking petrified,” Stiles admitted, standing beside their bunk bed, tapping his short-bitten nails – another nervous human habit he’d picked up somewhere – against one of the metal support poles. “I mean, it’s kind of surreal? In a few short minutes we’re going to be stepping off ARGUS to the main base – this ship, before, with Scott, I mean – ARGUS was everything I’ve ever known.” He shrugged, folding his arms nervously, unfolding them for a second, and then folding them again. “I didn’t even have a human body when I was on a mission to other planets, so everything I’ve known has been the inside of this ship. And now we’re going to be stepping off into a new planet – we’ll be on _Earth_ , and – I mean, it’s –”

“ – kind of overwhelming?” Derek supplied, dumping the bag on the ground near the door.

“Yeah, exactly,” he exhaled heavily. “I know I don’t have anything to freak out about. But the idea of breathing actual air instead of filtered, recycled oxygen, the idea of seeing plants in real life instead of through a screen or a projection, I don’t know, man.”

“It’s going to be fine,” Derek assured him, closing the small distance between them in a couple of steps. Their bodies instinctively sought each other out, meeting in the middle like magnets, Derek’s arms slipping around Stiles’ waist like they belonged there (because they did), the same as Stiles’ arms around Derek’s shoulders. He could smell the distressed scent emanating from him, even if Stiles’ tone was casually indifferent.

“I know you’re afraid,” he murmured, tucking his nose in that lovable spot behind Stiles’ ear. “And I’m not going to say you shouldn’t be, because they’re your feelings and they’re real. But you’ll have me and Laura and Peter with you, and you’ll get to meet Cora as soon as we disembark. Mom and the rest of the family are so excited to see you that they’ve brought out the good china and built a bonfire in the Preserve. Dad’s made his famous lasagne with the secret recipe béchamel sauce, and he only busts that out when he’s trying to impress someone.” God help him, he’d spent far too much time around Stiles – he was starting to get wordsy.

“What if they’re not impressed by little old me?” Stiles joked, but the fingers clutching his shirt tightened a little with dread. Derek drew back just enough so that he could cradle Stiles’ cheek in his palm, make him look up so that their eyes locked.

“Do you love me?” he asked.

“Of course! You know I do.” Stiles answered immediately.

“Do I make you happy?”

“More than anything,” he answered again, no hint of a lie in his even heartbeat, in those earnest, whiskey-coloured eyes that were looking at him with such heart-wrenching sincerity.

“Because that’s how I feel about you, Stiles,” Derek said, touching their foreheads together, his other broad palm resting on the back of Stiles’ neck. “You’re my mate. You’re stubborn and intelligent, and loyal like a wolf. I love you, and you make _me_ happy – and that will be enough for my family.”

“And – and Scott?” Stiles whispered, his voice shaking and the hands lying against Derek’s chest trembling. “Do you think he’d want to see me? D’you – think he remembers me?”

“It shouldn’t be too difficult to find an ex-Argonaut by the surname of McCall, especially one who was so highly decorated,” he said. “And when we do, I’m sure that he’ll want to see you more than anything. After all,” he smiled and dipped in for a kiss, a brief, quick press of lips, a touch of comfort, “you’re someone that’s impossible to forget.”

“Underneath that gruff exterior and mostly monosyllabic surface, you’re surprisingly eloquent and romantic,” Stiles chuckled, nuzzling his nose against the stubble of Derek’s chin. “And also a massive fucking goober, but that’s one of the many reasons why I think you’re perfect. That, and your amazing ass.”

“Glad to see your nerves haven’t affected your classy repertoire,” Derek deadpanned, stealing one more kiss and then stepping back. He picked up the bag from the ground and hoisted over his shoulder, then stepped within the motion sensor of the door enough to make it open. Half-turning back, he extended his arm out, hand open and outstretched towards Stiles? “You ready to go?”

“Yeah,” Stiles beamed, taking a hold of Derek’s hand with his own, warm, long fingers fitting so perfectly between his. “Let’s go home.”

 

**THE END**


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